This is the Ghost of James Lee Byars Calling
Byars, James Lee
Los Angeles. Eugenia Butler Gallery. 1969
A scarce series of invitation cards for 'This is the Ghost of James Lee Byars Calling' at Eugenia Butler Gallery (Los Angeles), 1969, each with the artist's own handwritten note.
James Lee Byars' cryptic notes, written and numbered (seemingly at random) in red, reads as follows: (Card 1): ''(65) I loved Balenciaga's dresses' '60' The double OO is Berdorf's sign' / (Card 2):'(61) The first produce I made in sch. was a red bird with revolving wings and total rotation (62)The last was my Phd. fic.'and (Card 3): '(63) My newest taste is snails (64) I like Black silk sheets'.
For 'This is the Ghost of James Lee Byars Calling' Byars transformed the gallery into an entirely red room with a sole light source from a two-and-a-half inch hole cut in the ceiling. The only entrance into the dark gallery space was through a two-and-a-half foot hole, and participants were asked to read various communications (describing Byars) that were sent to the gallery from people around the world to audibly reconstruct the artist. In addition to the mailed cards, the artist also wrote out various statements on the back of the gallery's pentagonal card invitations.
[see James Lee Byars, Bücher, Editionen, Ephemera, Neues Museum Weserburg Bremen, no. 53a].
James Lee Byars' cryptic notes, written and numbered (seemingly at random) in red, reads as follows: (Card 1): ''(65) I loved Balenciaga's dresses' '60' The double OO is Berdorf's sign' / (Card 2):'(61) The first produce I made in sch. was a red bird with revolving wings and total rotation (62)The last was my Phd. fic.'and (Card 3): '(63) My newest taste is snails (64) I like Black silk sheets'.
For 'This is the Ghost of James Lee Byars Calling' Byars transformed the gallery into an entirely red room with a sole light source from a two-and-a-half inch hole cut in the ceiling. The only entrance into the dark gallery space was through a two-and-a-half foot hole, and participants were asked to read various communications (describing Byars) that were sent to the gallery from people around the world to audibly reconstruct the artist. In addition to the mailed cards, the artist also wrote out various statements on the back of the gallery's pentagonal card invitations.
[see James Lee Byars, Bücher, Editionen, Ephemera, Neues Museum Weserburg Bremen, no. 53a].
Three pentagonal cards. (each c. 100 mm x 100 mm). Pentagonal pieces of white card gilded on one side. On the gilded side, text printed offset in red: 'This is the Ghost of James Lee Byars Calling. 615 N. La Cienega Blvd, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A.'.
#47730
