Welcome to One Fine Show, where Observer highlights a recently opened exhibition at a museum not in New York City, a place we know and love that already receives plenty of attention.
I live in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, a place that, on the weekends, is nothing but lines. People are obsessed with waiting in line here, though it is not a part of the local culture. Indeed, the treats for which the visitors wait could be obtained easily on a weekday, were we to want to buy them. The velvet rope sits folded among its line-guiding brass pylons outside the TikTok-famous bagel shop, unnecessary on a Thursday. It feels like a sculpture, though more accurately, it is a physical remnant of the weekend’s social sculpture.
“Social sculpture” is, of course, a term coined by Joseph Beuys (1921-1986) to conceptualize all of humanity and its activities as an artwork. Visitors who were in Los Angeles last week for Frieze no doubt caught “In Defense of Nature,” a survey of his work at The Broad featuring over 400 works from the Broad’s impressive collection, but focusing particularly on his project 7000 Oaks (1982), which planted that number of trees across Kassel, Germany for Documenta and aimed to draw attention to the relatively quaint ecological issues of the time.
Visitors new to the work of Beuys will find all the hits here. There is his Felt Suit (1970) and felt-laden Sled (1969), part of his felt oeuvre that emerged from his self-mythology about being shot down in Crimea in 1944 and healed by Tatars, who swaddled his body in fat and felt.
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Beuys had his shticks, including that this process had left him insane. One of his more attractive works in this show is also one of the last ones he made: Capri Battery (1985), a light bulb that only needs to be changed every thousand hours—an impressive length at the time—because it is powered by a lemon and therefore impossible to turn on. There is also his handsome Hare Stone (1982), which recalls the famous performance piece in which he tried to explain paintings to a dead rabbit.
The 7000 Oaks project has led the museum to pioneer Social Forest: Oaks of Tovaangar. Inspired by the Documenta project, Social Forest will plant 100 California native oak trees in Elysian Park’s Chávez Ridge area in partnership with the nonprofit North East Trees, its title referring to the name of the land in the Tongva (Gabrielino) language. The project is “grounded in two main themes present in 7000 Oaks,” writes curator Sarah Loyer in the catalogue; “first, a focus on ecology and environmentalism in response to human intervention on the land; and second, a means of collectively working through historical trauma toward reconciliation and restoration.” Her description of the latter theme likely refers to our imperialist impulses at home and abroad, and it has acquired new density following recent events like the wildfires.
It’s an important show by a genius artist whose ideas changed the world, and who could oppose the planting of trees? But after everything that’s happened, one does have to wonder if we should still be looking to artists for political solutions in 2025.
“Joseph Beuys: In Defense of Nature” is on view at The Broad through March 23rd.