FLUXUS - BUKOFF NEVER STOPS - 2005-02-08

Many are called, but none are now chosen.
An open letter to the remaining 1st and 2nd generation Fluxus
AYO
Eric Andersen
Henry Flynt
Ken Friedman
Geoff Hendricks
Alison Knowles
Larry Miller
Yoko Ono
Nam June Paik
Ben Patterson
Carolee Schneemann
Ben Vautier
Lamonte Young
Emmett Williams
-other names to be added to this list
6 January 2005
Dear Fluxus,
I was very fond of Emily Harvey. I miss her a lot. I am sorry I will not be there to help
you honor and remember Emily Harvey tonight.
Emily Harvey's passing marks a passing for me, too. I am walking away from Fluxus. It
is, unfortunately, unnecessary to announce my departure: most of you don't even know
me. You probably didn't even realize that I am a part of Fluxus and that I operate and
host a number of websites that have promoted Fluxus for the last nine years. And none
of you have ever acknowledged that I am, in fact, an active Fluxus artist who has
pioneered new directions and forged new sensibilities in Fluxus for more than 20 years
now. That is why I am leaving.
Twenty years ago I fell in love with Fluxus and the monumental creative revolutions you
all initiated more than 40 years ago. You changed and expanded what creativity and
knowing means. You changed Western culture. You changed the world. You ripped a
new hole in the universe. And you did it with simple little ideas, games, objects,
performances, and concepts. I will always admire your astonishing accomplishments.
What you did was so big that no historian, writer, collector, or curator has ever gotten
their arms around it satisfactorily.
But an equally astonishing thing has been going on in Fluxus for the last twenty years.
You have been letting Fluxus die.
At one time you welcomed people to Fluxus. You recruited people to Fluxus. I know you
have always been a contentious lot, but there was a time when the Fluxus door was
open, you invited people in, and you made it grow. You embraced a "second wave" of
Fluxus artists--e.g., Ken Friedman, Larry Miller. You encouraged new Fluxus work and
new Fluxus projects. But as far as I can tell, this pretty much stopped 20 or more years
ago (Friedman's Young Fluxus show in 1982 is the last time any of you sponsored a
show of "new" Fluxus artists). What happened to you?
Letting Fluxus die is a terrific and unnecessary shame and I place most of the blame on
you (the people to whom this letter is addressed). I blame you individually and I blame
you collectively. You have served Fluxus poorly during these last 20 years and you are
letting Fluxus die. It didn't have to be this way. For the last 20 years, an increasing
number of mostly young, bright, and talented people have been showing up and
knocking on the Fluxus club house door ... and almost all of you have either been too
deaf or self-centered to hear them, or worse, you have continued to wring your hands
over whether anyone should or could open the door (the issue of who has the "authority"
to welcome and declare new Fluxus artists has been a convenient excuse). All you
really had to do was open the door and show a little kindness. Why has that been so
hard for all of you to do?
During the last 20 years many different people have been "called" to Fluxus. I am one of
those people. We learned about Fluxus in one way or another and were struck by
lightning, had an epiphany...and generally felt we had found a place where we really
belonged. We had hoped to find a home in Fluxus. And many of just started doing and
being Fluxus in our own way...much like all of the original Fluxus folks had their own
individual understanding and gifts for Fluxus activities. And one way or another as we
have gotten stronger in our own Fluxus work, we have stepped forward and tried to
share this work with you. Needing to find some acknowledgement and encouragement
from the people who launched this Fluxus ship. We approached you with respect. We
approached you as Fluxus authorities. We knocked on the door and you did not
answer. The most that some of you have been able to do for a whole new generation of
Fluxus artists is hand us some tedious book on Fluxus so we could "study up," or you
smiled patronizingly and encouraged us to attend your next exhibition. You didn't even
seem to consider that any of these new folks could take you and Fluxus some place new
and exciting where it hadn't been before. And frankly, some of these new Fluxus folks
have been doing more interesting work and more truly Fluxus work than many of you
have been doing during the last 20 years.
Many bright and talented people have not stayed long to knock, however. They heard
the authoritative pronouncements that Fluxus was "dead" or "over." This was very
confusing and discouraging--many of us could feel the spirit of Fluxus alive in ourselves
and in our own work, so we couldn't understand how Fluxus could be dead. But you
didn't answer the door and many eventually walked away. I have knocked longer than
most--for more than 20 years now since I founded Fluxus Midwest in 1982. Dick
Higgins and Emily Harvey (and Carolee Schneemann) were the only ones to
acknowledge and encourage my own Fluxus work and experiments, but now Dick and
now Emily are gone, I'm out in the cold, and I'm tired of knocking. So I am packing up
my Fluxus bags, and taking my creativity and energies elsewhere.
I am closing down the many internet websites I have constructed and hosted to promote
and honor Fluxus: The Fluxus Portal, the Fluxus Homepage, the Emily Harvey Gallery,
the Museum of the Sub-Conscious, the Dick Higgins memorial website, and numerous
other webpages promoting the work of many original Fluxus artists. I doubt that many of
you will notice. I have also walked away from FLUXLIST--the pioneering Fluxus email
discussion group that I co-founded with Dick and Ken Friedman. FLUXLIST is another
example of what I am talking about. Most of you could never even bother to subscribe.
By not participating you have missed a great audience and a wonderful chance to
discover and encourage many new Fluxus artists and to learn about their work. It would
have given you back more energy than it would have taken.
Almost all of you have failed to recognize three obvious things about Fluxus--about the
Fluxus you helped create!
1. Fluxus is more than Art. It's bigger than that. To confine it to being understood
as being primarily a phenomenon in the realm of art is to let it die.
2. Fluxus can still be a vibrant and energetic force. By refusing or failing to
recognize this for the last 20 years, you have been letting Fluxus die.
3. Fluxus is bigger than you. Fluxus is bigger than the initial group or Fluxers, it's
bigger than Maciunas. You guys didn't finish off or "complete" the Fluxus project,
you just got it started! Many others have come to Fluxus with new Fluxus ideas
and projects, and many of you haven't even bothered to notice. By confining
Fluxus to yourselves, you are letting it die.
You all have spent so much time during the last 20 years trying to shape your legacy
and the legacy of Fluxus, and few if any of you are satisfied with the results--the
exhibitions, the collections, the books. Instead of trying to manage Old Fluxus you could
have been leading a new group of Fluxus artists to explore new Fluxus directions and
new Fluxus territory? Wouldn't it have been a lot more energizing and a lot more fun to
fan new Fluxus flames than struggle with collectors who have catalogued your work but
failed to capture your spirit or the scope of your actual accomplishments?
I can only imagine that if George Maciunas were alive today he might have
excommunicated you all by now and found a new and younger gang of Fluxus rabble
rousers to continue his mischievousness. I imagine him cooking up guerrilla art activities
and staging "terrorist" art attacks against some of the collectors and historians who
demean him and you by saying Fluxus was no bigger than him and no bigger than you.
Fluxus has the potential to be a bigger, more vibrant and creative force in the world
today than even the project George Maciunas imagined. Certainly the world's need for
the expanded creativity and the knowing that Fluxus provides is greater than ever.
Because of the availability of more publications and catalogs documenting Fluxus work
and because of the internet, more people know more about Fluxus than ever before.
Fluxus is attracting more people than ever before--as much outside the art world as in.
More people than ever before want to participate in and make their own contribution to
Fluxus. But you--the founders, the brave pioneers--have turned your back on them.
And you have turned your back on a marvelous opportunity to expand your legacy and
help Fluxus continue.
Sincerely,
Allen Bukoff, PhD
Social Psychologist and Fluxus Artist
Birmingham, Michigan

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