Folded exhibition announcement poster published in conjunction with Joseph Kosuth's first solo exhibition held in October 1968.
"Joseph Kosuth, at Gallery 669, in his quest to strip away from his art everything but the idea, has arrived at a series of dictionary definitions of the word NOTHING, executed (not by the artist) photographically, in black 4 by 4 foot panels with white lettering. A few doors away, at the Molly Barnes Gallery, is an exhibition of paintings by John Baldessari, who, in his way, is also interested in a strict elimination of "formal" esthetic encumbrances—as well as (in answer to Kosuth?) the idea: on one of his black-lettered-on-grey canvases is written, Everything is purged from this painting but art, no ideas have entered this work. Baldessari quotes freely from composition primers or Kubler's Shape of Time (This painting owes its existence to prior paintings. By liking this solution, you should not be blocked in your continued acceptance of prior inventions. To attain this position, ideas of former paintings had to be rethought in order to transcend former work. To like this painting, you will have to understand prior work. Ultimately this work will amalgamate with the existing body of knowledge) or Barbara Rose (For Barbara Rose: A work by an artist who is aware not only of the cycles of styles, but of levels of meanings, of influences of movements, and critical judgments); and he sometimes combines his texts with photographs, as in the canvas showing an old Artforum cover (November, 1965) with the caption, This is not to be looked at. There is also a picture of Art Fundamentals: Theory and Practice by Ocvirk, Bone, Stinson and Wigg (2nd edition) with the sentence Place this book in a strong light and this is what you will see. An even worse photograph, of a parking lot, is accompanied by an excerpt from a photography composition manual: An artist is not merely the slavish announcer of a series of facts, which in this case the camera has had to accept and mechanically record. Two works are not paintings but long boxes with word-punched tapes moving over white light. The messages are textbook quotations.
Baldessari is at his best quoting a frame by frame analysis of D. W. Griffith's Intolerance: Finishes watering it—examines plant to see if it has any signs of growth, finds slight evidence—one part is sagging—she runs finger along it—raises hand over plant to encourage it to grow.
Kosuth's most moving definition is from the Oxford Dictionary:
NO' THING (nu-), n. & adv.
1. No thing (with adj. following, as ~ great is easy)."
–– JANE LIVINGSTON, "Reviews: Los Angeles," Artforum (December 1968)