CAG.2808 Danny McCarthy, A Keeper of the Dust (for Joseph Beuys), 2011, Lambda print (series of 5), 50 x 60 cm each. Purchased, the Artist, 2011. © the artist.

WORK OF THE WEEK!

A Keeper of the Dust (for Joseph Beuys) is a work created as a result of a performance by Danny McCarthy.

As its title indicates, this is a direct response to the German performance artist Joseph Beuys (1921-1986) who had given one of his blackboard performances, “The Secret Block for a Secret Person in Ireland”, in the Gallery’s lecture theatre on 26 September 1974. McCarthy, then in his twenties, was present.

‘In a world increasingly manipulated by publicity, political propaganda, the culture business and the Press,’ Beuys reportedly stated at this Arts Council of Ireland sponsored lecture, ‘it is not to the named- but to the nameless – that [art schools] offer a forum.’

Unlike in other venues where they were preserved, following his Cork lecture Beuys’ blackboard was inadvertently wiped clean, and the index of his performance was lost.

Aware of what had happened, McCarthy collected the chalk dust from the base of the blackboard and stored it until, in 2011, Seán Lynch invited him as ‘keeper of the dust’ to create a performance of his own for the exhibition, A Rocky Road. Taking place at Crawford Art Gallery, this saw the artist deposit chalk dust into various points throughout the building.

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That performance, and Beuys’ original one in 1974, are both embodied and remembered in this artwork and, indeed, in the cracks and corners of the Gallery’s building.

Danny McCarthy (b.1950) is one of the pioneers of performance art and sound art in Ireland. His new sound installation, Gort An Eist (Whispering The Names Of Places Long Forgotten), is currently at the Old Market House Arts Centre, Dungarvan.

A Keeper of the Dust (for Joseph Beuys) by Danny McCarthy is featured in SITE OF CHANGE: Evolution of a Building which must close this Sunday 12 November.

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