On Kawara, “One Million Years,” installation view
Last Saturday, Valentine’s Day, I celebrated with my fiancée in a somewhat unconventional manner: For a little more than an hour, we read numbers aloud, from 79,936 to 80,495, in a small recording studio. We did so as part of artist On Kawara’s decades-long ongoing project One Million Years, which was being presented at David Zwirner Gallery. From the gallery’s description:
One Million Years is a monumental 20-volume collection, comprised of One Million Years [Past], created in 1969 and containing the years 998,031 B.C. through 1969 A.D., and One Million Years [Future], created in 1981 and containing the years 1996 A.D. to 1,001,995 A.D. Together these volumes make up 2,000,000 years. The subtitle for One Million Years [Past] is “For all those who have lived and died.” The subtitle for One Million Years [Future] is “For the last one.” Documenting the passage of chronological time, each leather hardbound volume contains 2,068 photocopied pages. The size of each volume is 12 ¼ x 10 x 3 ¼ inches and weighs 8 lbs. 12 editions of [Past] were produced from 1970 to 1971, and 12 editions of [Future] from 1981 to 1998.
Since 1993, invited guests, in pairs, have been recording an audio version of the artwork that is later presented on CDs. Julia and I were the final participants in the first live recording of a public reading; prior to our session, four pairs a day had read, five days a week, for four weeks.
Kawara is perhaps best known for his “date paintings,” which is the colloquial name given to his “Today” series, begun in 1966. Each work in the series must be completed by midnight on the date it is started, and depicts the date (in white text on variously colored monochrome backgrounds) in the language and grammatical conventions of the country in which it is made. Each is made by hand, and accompanied by a cardboard box in which the painting rests when not on display; often a clipping from the day’s newspaper lines the interior of the box. I am a fan of Kawara’s art in general, and this series in particular, and have profited from the temporary suspension of the present afforded by viewing exhibitions of these paintings. Despite their specificity—JANUARY 25, 1966; 9.JULI 1976; 27 MAI 1993—I usually feel mildly unmoored from time’s ceaseless regularity as I contemplate them. The mental effort of reconciling the present to the past causes my sense of both to dilate and contract.
Somewhat to my surprise, then, while recording our allotted numbers I didn’t think much about the past, the future, or the passage of time. (At one point, though, I began to imagine what certain animals might look like after 78,000 years of additional evolution.) For the first half hour the predominant feeling, because the recording took place in the semi-public environment of an art gallery, was a performer’s self-consciousness. We were sitting in front of a large window and could see everyone who came into the gallery as clearly as they could see (and hear) us. It was less difficult than I had suspected to keep track of our place in the black binders full of pages printed with miniscule rows of numbers, and after a few minutes I began confidently acknowledging those on the other side of the glass by nodding my head. I waved at small children and at the many friends who trooped through the space in the final hours before the exhibition closed.
After a while, the experience shifted and became more intimate. My performance was for Julia. She was reading even numbers and I was reading odd numbers. Though in my concentration on the dates for which I was responsible I neglected to listen to the particular numbers she was reading, I was deeply aware of the sound of her voice in my ear and of her physical presence at my side. The call-and-response became tinged, very subtly, with erotic feeling.
Being enclosed in an intimate space and on view to the public became a metaphor for the bond we share, and to which we had made a lifelong commitment just one week before. It didn’t feel like us against the world, but rather us in the world, indivisibly together. All too common are the tragic events in life that make you aware of the bonds that connect you to friends and lovers. Rarer are the happy occasions in which relationships are instantiated. I am grateful to On Kawara for inadvertently providing one to me.
Tags: On Kawara, One Million Years
February 23, 2009 at 3:53 pm
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