[artinfo] Mierle Laderman Ukeles at Grazer Kunstverein

[e-flux]

Mierle Laderman Ukeles

Maintenance Art Works 1969-1980

The Grazer Kunstverein kicks off its inaugural 
program dedicated to notions of social 
abstraction by presenting the very first 
comprehensive European solo exhibition of the 
artist's earlier work. Originally organized in 
1998 by Ronald Feldman Fine Arts gallery in New 
York, the exhibition presents a body of 
work spanning over a decade of significant 
production. 

The work of Mierle Laderman Ukeles (b. 1939, 
Denver) concerns the everyday routines of life. 
In 1969, following the birth of her first child, 
Ukeles wrote "Manifesto for Maintenance Art" as a 
challenge to the binary systems of opposition 
that draw the line between art/life, 
nature/culture, and public/private. The manifesto 
proposed undoing boundaries that separate the 
maintenance of everyday life from the role of an 
artist in society. Ukeles was interested in how 
artists could use the concept of transference to 
empower people to act as agents of change and 
stimulate positive community involvement toward 
ecological sustainability. In the 1960s, Ukeles 
completed an undergraduate degree in history and 
international studies at Barnard and studied 
visual arts at Pratt Institute in New York. 
Ukeles's work at this time was experimental, and 
visually and symbolically conveyed the social 
unrest surrounding events, such as the women's 
movement and the Vietnam War.

Ukeles became increasingly disturbed by the 
separation of the artist in society from everyday 
activities, such as childcare, household work, 
and other routine labor practices that she felt 
should be reinterpreted within the contexts of 
personal and political aesthetic values. Ukeles 
has stated that "Avant-garde art, which claims 
utter development, is infected by strains of 
maintenance ideas, maintenance activities, and 
maintenance materialsŠ"

"I am an artist. I am a woman. I am a wife. I am 
a mother. (Random order) I do a hell of a lot of 
washing, cleaning, cooking, renewing, supporting, 
preserving, etc. Also, (up to now separately) I 
'do' Art. Now I will simply do these everyday 
things, and flush them up to consciousness, 
exhibit them, as Art." (Ukeles, 1969)

Ukeles' very first publication focusing on her 
"Ballet Works" produced between 1983 and 2012 
will be produced by Kunstverein, Amsterdam in 
collaboration with the Grazer Kunstverein, and 
will be published by Sternberg Press with the 
support of Ronald Feldman Fine Arts, New York and 
the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the 
Fine Arts.

9 March-19 May 2013

Grazer Kunstverein
Burggasse 4
8010 Graz, Austria
www.grazerkunstverein.org