Free Figuration, by Ben Vautier

On page 260 of Ben Vautier. Is everything art?

©2015 Museum Tinguely, Basel, Kehrer Verlag Heidelberg Berlin, authors, artists and photographers [and translator!]. ISBN 978-3-86828-649-6

Truth be told, I invented this term in order to put an end to the diktat of Support/Surfaces and the Conceptuals at the art schools.

Free to what? / Free to make ugly / Free to make dirty / Free to prefer graffiti on the New York subway over paintings at the Guggenheim / Free to have indigestion from Support/Surfaces / Free to say “Ben’s linear history of art, fuck that!” / Free to prefer spending the night in a night club over listening to Sollers / Free to want to re-do Matisse, Picasso, Bonnard / Free to sing Maréchal nous voilà or Viens poupoule viens / Free to like Mickey, the cartoon, not Lacan / Free not to give a damn if someone says to you: “You copy”/ Free to say: “Carpaccio, don’t know that!” / Free to sell for cash / Free to paint your dick in action / Free to paint on anything at all. 

Vautier Ben French artist Everything art art history translation translator Basel Museum Tinguely