A Complete Guide to What to Do In New York Over 4th of July Weekend
- c/o diaart.org
- Thomas Hirschhorn, prepatory drawings
DIA Art Foundation presents Thomas Hirschhorn’s Gramsci Monument
So, first, no. Gramsci is not just someone that Marie Calloway wants to have you tell her about while you’re having sex. Antonio Gramsci was one of the greatest thinkers and revolutionaries in the 20th Century, who is most famous for his Prison Notebooks and for coining terms like “cultural hegemony,” terms without which I personally wouldn’t be able to feel superior to others when talking out of my ass. Anyway, Thomas Hirschhorn has selected both Gramsci and New York City for his fourth and final installation in his Monuments project (prior to this, he honored Spinoza in Amsterdam, Deleuze in Avignon, and Bataille in Kassel, Germany) which aims “‘to establish a definition of monument,’ to provoke encounters, to create an event, and to think Gramsci today.” This installation is located in the Forest Houses, a public housing development in the Morrisania section of the Bronx. The monument will be an evolving project and will be built by residents of Forest Houses and will “be open daily, offering a daily program of lectures by philosopher Marcus Steinweg, a children’s workshop run by Lex Brown, a play titled the Gramsci Theater, a radio station, and a daily newspaper.” Though grand in scale and ambition, this work also is fascinating on a micro level, as it closely involves people who live near the project and who otherwise might not have been exposed to either the work of Hirschhorn or Gramsci. It is definitely worth a trip up to the Bronx to see what exactly is going on.
Gramsci Monumet; Forest Houses, off Tinton Avenue between 163rd and 165th Streets, Morrisania