Yoko Ono book titled Grapefruit with score

Yoko Ono, score from the book titled Grapefruit, published 1964

On view: March 18 - April 5, 2019

Closing reception: Thursday, April 4, 2019 from 8-10pm

Mark Allen and Kareem Collie are team teaching an advanced design course this semester with their class meeting between Studio Art Hall and The Hive. Chan Gallery will present one of the projects that students will create: a score that is visualized through the application of vinyl text and/or design. Following is the project description for the students to interpret and in turn create works to be presented in the gallery.

For this project we will be exploring the idea of visual / textual score. Traditionally we think of a score as the copy of a musical composition in written or printed notation. But in the 20th century, artists expanded the idea of the score in all kinds of directions. A score has become a way to organize improvised music, the instructions for a dance performance, a thought experiment, or a kind of poetry. Here are three of our favorite mid 20th century scores.

Draw a line and follow it

Make a salad

Steal this book

How then does a score differ from a manifesto, and exhortation, a poem or a set of instructions? Is that airplane safety diagram a score for a plane crash opera? Could we think of IKEA construction graphics as a kind of score? Let’s find out!

For the first half of this project we will research the history of experimental scores, and write some of our own. Then you will design a presentation of your score as a wall graphic, which will be cut out of vinyl and then installed in the art department gallery.