Elena: Fluxus

Fluxus is an artistic movement organized by George Maciunas in the 1960s. George Maciunas isn't Fluxus by himself. He simply organized and named a movement which was already brewing and continues to this day. Some historians would disagree with me and say that Fluxus died with Maciunas, but I feel that Fluxus is very alive today if you look at multi-media digital art performances. In Maciunas's Fluxus Manifesto, he wrote that Fluxus is meant to "…purge the world of bourgeois sickness, ‘intellectual’, professional & commercialized culture . . . PROMOTE A REVOLUTIONARY FLOOD AND TIDE IN ART, . . . promote NON ART REALITY to be grasped by all peoples, not only critics, dilettantes and professionals . . . FUSE the cadres of cultural, social & political revolutionaries into united front & action.” I think that describes Fluxus well. It's really a mode of thought revolving around "anti-art" and humor that is expressed in all sorts of artistic media. Wikipedia would say:

"The Fluxus artistic philosophy can be expressed as a synthesis of four key factors that define the majority of Fluxus work:

1. Fluxus is an attitude. It is not a movement or a style.
2. Fluxus is intermedia. Fluxus creators like to see what happens when different media intersect. They use found and everyday objects, sounds, images, and texts to create new combinations of objects, sounds, images, and texts.
3. Fluxus works are simple. The art is small, the texts are short, and the performances are brief.
4. Fluxus is fun. Humour has always been an important element in Fluxus."

Some Fluxus artists include Yoko Ono, John Cage, Nam June Paik (posted below), George Brecht, Wolf Vostell, Joseph Beuys, Henry Flynt, and many other performance, conceptual, electronic music, poetic, and visual artists, although some of these artists did not really want to be associated with a movement. I am finding it difficult to post just one image since Fluxus is a complex and varied piece of the art history puzzle. I recommend searching Fluxus on youtube.