Heiko wrote: >I wouldnt put Ken and Dick too much into the same basket. I think Ken was sometimes too Fluxish, too Maciunas centered, whereas Dick was more openminded, playfull in practice, and hey, this thing is called POP ;-)< Well Fluxus was essentially the addition of a label to forms of creativity in art and music that had already been in existence for a number of years. Ken was Fluxist because he became an artist when Maciunas invited him to join Fluxus so his career as an artist is defined by his work in Fluxus because he has not worked outside of that field. Dick Higgins on the other hand worked outside of Fluxus before and after Fluxus appeared. In reality Something Else Press (SEP) is independent from Fluxus. Although the two are lumped together now Maciunas did not want SEP to be a part of Fluxus and indeed when one looks at many of its publications they are not characteristic of Fluxus publications (when compared to Maciunas' style) nor do they bear the Fluxus copyright. Also SEP was reprinting Gertrude Stein etc. at one point so essentially the only thing linking SEP to Fluxus are the Fluxus artists who staffed it. Many artists associated with Fluxus have separate careers but for some of those artists they are best known for their involvement with Fluxus and so just considered to be Fluxus artists. For example no-one refers to Joseph Beuys or Yoko Ono as primarily Fluxus Artists. As for Pop well in many ways Fluxus was Pop but the crucial difference is that Fluxus named itself whereas Pop was a label given after the fact by the critics and commentators of the day. cheers, Sol.
