Compose styles
Rather than blending styles toward a middle, this gives them roles. The first one carries the structure, the next comes in as the accent, and anything after that shows up in a single detail. Where they fight each other, it says so before you start.
How to divide the work
- Composition
- Follow Fluxus: One item per card, with the order of the deck left unfixed
- Type
- Set in Fluxus's manner (Write each instruction as one imperative line and print it still open to reading), and let Gutai's lettering (Keep records to date and act described, adding no meaning through a title) appear only where you want the eye to catch.
- Material
- Ground in Fluxus's material (Found objects, paper, wooden boxes, cheap printing, no signature or scarcity); bring in exactly one thing from Gutai (Mud, paper, water, bulbs and paint, keeping the marks of tearing and treading).
- Colour
- Build on #ece6d7, #c43d31, #22201d and admit one accent from #e6dfd1, #d84831, #25211f.
Where they fight
These are already listed as related entries, so the join should come easily.
Caution
- Fluxus Imitating random instructions and plain boxes settles nothing about ownership, authority and the audience's role, and a score framed on the wall without ever being performed loses the premise of action and participation.
- Gutai Restaging the physical gesture without responding to what the material does leaves only spectacle. Read the thought behind it, postwar Japan, the autonomy of material and the audience taking part.
Image prompt
Produce four original images that take their structure from Fluxus (style, early 1960s–late 1970s) and their accent from Gutai (style, 1954–1972). ## What to make Make the kind of thing Fluxus exists for: works and programs written as instructions that exist only when someone performs them, or cheap multiples boxed and circulated hand to hand as small scale publishing. Choose one subject and hold it across all four. ## Structure comes from Fluxus - Event scores - Boxes and multiples - Everyday actions - Anti-art humor Composition: One item per card, with the order of the deck left unfixed. Type and lettering: Write each instruction as one imperative line and print it still open to reading. ## Accent comes from Gutai, used sparingly - Body colliding with material - Outdoor exhibitions - Tearing, throwing, treading - Participation and play Let one material quality come from it: Mud, paper, water, bulbs and paint, keeping the marks of tearing and treading. ## Colour and feeling Build the ground on #ece6d7, carry the structure in #c43d31 and #22201d, and let a single accent come from #d84831. These are read off real works, so a direction rather than a fixed palette. Feeling to carry: rebellion, play, intimacy, exhilaration. ## What goes wrong - Fluxus: Imitating random instructions and plain boxes settles nothing about ownership, authority and the audience's role, and a score framed on the wall without ever being performed loses the premise of action and participation. - Gutai: Restaging the physical gesture without responding to what the material does leaves only spectacle. Read the thought behind it, postwar Japan, the autonomy of material and the audience taking part. ## Across the four Keep the roles fixed in all four. Vary the framing, the scale and the arrangement so the set shows what this pairing can do rather than four versions of one picture. ## Constraints - Do not imitate, reference or name any specific artist, studio, brand, character or copyrighted work. - Do not reproduce the composition of an existing work. - Produce original compositions in the general period languages described above.
Related entries
- Fluxus early 1960s–late 1970s / Style / Avant-garde
Values the act and the participation above the finished piece, working in scores, boxes, cheap multiples, performances and events until the border between art and daily life gives way.
- Gutai 1954–1972 / Style / Japanese Postwar Avant-garde
Acts directly on body, mud, paper, water, smoke and light bulbs, making the work an event in which spirit does not master material and each exposes the nature of the other.
Share this composition:https://indexstyle.org/compose?ids=fluxus+gutai