Dear Readers,

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Welcome to the February 2009 TAS. I do not know if many of us in this unusual time both in the art world and the world at large are thinking about things if not in identical ways, than at least in ways that form a collective unconscious where the whole is greater than the parts. Such a collectivity of thought is evident in this issue.

This month’s writers do not know each other, do not live in the same countries, and I am quite certain were educated in different places. Yet their individual paths have led them here to reflect on a time in the art world of 50 years ago, circa 1958, and the ebb and flow of the different aesthetics of that time and the connections between artists in New York, California, and Europe. The overlaps among their articles are subtle, yet uncanny.

It is true that whereas Anna Leung’s and Robert Stalker’s respective contributions are historical reflections, Giuseppe Gavazza writes about e/static, a space in Turin, Italy that is devoted to the art of the immediate present. Nevertheless, both he and Carlo Fossati, the director of e/static, often think about art in relation to the innovations of John Cage, Fluxus, and George Brecht.

It is for confluences like these that I created TAS, and I so appreciate the thoughts and work of all our writers who have generously allowed myself as editor to bring them together for a richly multi-dimensional reading.

All my best,
Deanna