by Jon Lackman | 28 October 2009 | Contemporary, Museums
From The New York Observer:
Ever since he got his start in the art world as an editor at the influential bimonthly magazine Flash Art in Milan, [Massimiliano] Gioni has enjoyed an extraordinarily swift rise as a curator … Some of the more outlandish stunts Mr. Gioni has overseen … include sending a 90-foot helium balloon of a naked man flying through the skies, installing a house made of bread by [Urs] Fischer in a church, and hanging three puppet children made by the satirical artist Maurizio Cattelan from the oldest tree in Milan … In his current capacity at the New Museum, Mr. Gioni says he is devoted to promoting radical art, and to putting on shows that people love even though they can’t understand them … For me not getting it is part of the excitement” … “In a society and a culture in which everything has a message and everything has a meaning and everything has a purpose,” he said, “I think we should cherish things that are obscure, that are directionless, that are useless, that are complicated beyond reasonable levels. That’s the greatness of art– even in New York, where everything has a price” … he began making his name as a critic … But writing and editing “was just a way to be involved with art,” Mr. Gioni explained. “Eventually I started knowing artists more and more, and I realized that there were different ways to be engaged with them, besides writing about their work.” One of the more unusual ways Mr. Gioni did this was by collaborating with the artist Maurizio Cattelan, whom he served for three years starting around 1998 as a Cyrano de Bergerac-style press guru, pretending to be him while giving interviews and delivering lectures. “People would phone me thinking it was him, and I would give these interviews in his place, and I would make up things,” Mr. Gioni said. “It was sort of first a game, but it became a profession.”
(via Artinfo.com)
