This site requires Javascript to be turned on. Please enable Javascript and reload the page.

Exploding Tongues: Language, Art, and the Russian Avant-garde

George Maciunas. "Fluxus Manifesto," 1963

When George Maciunas consulted his dictionary he found that the word “flux” not only existed as a noun, a verb, and an adjective, but also had a total of seventeen different meanings. At the head of his Fluxus…Tentative Plan for Contents of the First 6 Issues, issued late in 1961, he rearranged five of these definitions to explain the use of the term Fluxus, bringing to the fore the idea of purging (and its association with the bowels). By 1963, these selected dictionary definitions of “flux” could no longer encompass the developing intentions of Fluxus, and Maciunas began to promote three particular senses of the word: purge, tide, and fuse—each not amplified by his own comments. These amounted to new working definitions of the three senses, and were refined to the point where they could finally be incorporated into a collaged, three-part Manifesto, together with photostats of eight of the dictionary definitions. The aims of Fluxus, as set out in the Manifesto of 1963, are extraordinary, but connect with the radical ideas fermenting at the time. The text suggests affinities with the ideas of Henry Flynt, as well as links with the aims of radical groups earlier in the century. The first of the three sections of Maciunas’ Manifesto revels that the intent of Fluxus is to “PURGE the world of dead art…abstract art, [and] illusionistic art…” What would be left after this purging would presumably be “concrete art,” which Maciunas equated with the real, or the ready-made. He explained the origins of concrete art, as he defined it, with reference to the ready-made objects of Marcel Duchamp, the ready-made sounds of John Cage, and the ready-made actions of George Brecht and Ben Vautier.

This page is referenced by:

Group Project Proposals 14 A resource page for preparation and submission of materials plain 2017-05-26T08:29:37-07:00
Students in ARTS 227 and CSLC 134 / RUSN 334 combine in self-selected groups to author and design page contributions to a course artist book. As a preliminary step toward their hands-on production work, groups devise a collective artistic identity, including a group name and a theoretical platform, articulated as an invented "ism" within a manifesto.

For inspiration and guidance in the creation of your own statements, browse through examples from the early Russian Avant-garde in the activity sheet and in the pdf below. George Maciunas's "Fluxus Manifesto" written a half-century later and an ocean away retains many of the same qualities and sensibilities. As you review these historical documents, consider:

What is the relationship between the gestures and ideas expressed in manifesti and the artwork they accompany?

Manifesti should account for significant formal and stylistic decisions in your page designs, such as selection and distribution of letters, choice of print v. handwritten text, color, and graphics, as well as the text and subject matter (if discernable). They may be as brief as an extended paragraph and as long as a page, can be written in stylized fashion, and must somehow include the following elements:
- A group name (e.g. World of Art, Union of Youth, Hylaea, Donkey’s Tail)
- An “ism” (e.g. Rayism, Neo-Primitivism, Futurism, Cubo-Futurism, Ego-Futurism, Everythingism, Nothingism, Prism, Schism, etc.)
- An articulation of the key theoretical principles, socio-political aspirations, and aesthetic qualities and devices at play in the book page, and in the “ism.”
- Group members may devise pseudonyms for the PDF submission, but must indicate their real names elsewhere