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An Alternative History of Art

Documentaries

Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

Series exploring overlooked visual artists from the 20th century.

Naomi Beckwith

Michael Umney

An Alternative History of Art: Ben Patterson

Ben Patterson

14/03/2018

BBC Radio 4 - An Alternative History of Art, Ben Patterson

Curator Naomi Beckwith profiles overlooked artist and Fluxus founder-member Ben Patterson.

Naomi Beckwith, curator at Chicago's Museum of Contemporary Art, explores the work of overlooked artist Ben Patterson - the only African American founder of the Fluxus movement.

Curator Naomi Beckwith continues the series exploring overlooked artists from the 20th century. Art history has been written from a white, western, male perspective. What if we could revise the canon?

Born in Pittsburgh in 1934, Ben Patterson was the only African American member of the avant garde Fluxus movement. After rejection from the American Symphony Orchestra because of his race, Patterson left the USA for Cologne. There, he was instrumental in a series of musical and artistic experiments which gave birth to Fluxus. However, after just a few years, Patterson took an almost 20 year hiatus from the art world, only reappearing in the 1980s. Patterson redefined the boundaries of art but was, in many cases, quite literally written out of Fluxus history. Was his race the reason for his obscurity? Patterson died last year, just after his first invitation to take part in the prestigious documenta 14.

Contributors include Bonaventure Ndikung (SAVVY Contemporary, Berlin), Mary Bauermeister (artist), George E Lewis (Composer, and trombonist for George E Lewis) and Kenny Goldsmith (poet and Fluxus historian).

The series features artists selected by three curators from different backgrounds - Iwona Blazwick (Director of the Whitechapel Gallery), Hans Ulrich Obrist (Artistic Director of the Serpentine Galleries) and Naomi Beckwith (Curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago). Told broadly chronologically with inter-changing presenters, the series explores why these artists have been obscured and why some are now being reinstated into the 20th century artistic canon.

Presenter: Naomi Beckwith
Producer: Michael Umney
Researcher: Jessie Lawson
Executive Producer: Joby Waldman
A Reduced Listening production for BBC Radio 4

Image (c) Christian Lauer 2012.

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