Mel Bochner's "Language is not transparent" (1969)

 

Bochner's work of art is now more than 50 years old, but that doesn't stop critics and art writers from still writing about it today. Look carefully at how Katherine Kilalea writes about it. 

Thinking about Jasmine L Combs's poem "Object" reminded me of this series of work. Bochner made many different versions or ideations of this simple phrase. Even though the phrase is the same, the work itself isn't. Does this prove his point? Language can't be transparent; it has a body.

Check out this short time-lapse video of an installation of the piece above in 2014.