The Cooper Union Interdisciplinary Seminar | Louder Than Bombs: The Convivial Origins of Red76 and the Framing of the Politics of our Everyday

the Cooper Union School of Art Interdisciplinary Seminar

Sam Gould

Louder Than Bombs: The Convivial Origins of Red76 and the Framing of the Politics of our Everyday

This lecture took place on February 9th, 2009 at 7:00 pm in the Wollman Auditorium at the Cooper Union

Lecture introduction

As the core practitioner within the projects developed by Red 76 since 2000, Sam Gould along with numerous collaborators has developed public archives, unearthed and highlighted under-utilized histories in print and digital form, and constructed myriad situations and environments in which to discuss the means in which we chose to occupy space and live out our lives, individually, and in turn, collectively.

Working somewhere within a gray-zone which might nominally be regarded as art and political activism, Red76 utilizes existing familiar frameworks and forms to collectively discuss how we view, relate, define, and respond to the political in our day-to-day lives. Looking into points within the history of the group, other like-minded contemporary practitioners, groups and individuals like Mark Rothko, the quilt makers of Gee’s Bend, Calvin Johnson and K records, and his own familial history in crime and theatre on the Lower East Side and Brownsville in New York City, Gould will discuss the means in which we are enveloped within politics - sometimes unwittingly, unknowingly - and propose a means in which artists and other interested parties can use aesthetics and ephemerality to look into the politics of our everyday, and develop a personal politics devoted to energy and possibilities, rather than oppression and stagnation.

About Sam Gould

Founded in January of 2000 in Portland, Oregon, Red76 is the moniker for collaboratively based initiatives conceived, most often, by Sam Gould, and fleshed out by a group of collaborators across the United States and abroad, who have included; Khris Soden, Zefrey Throwell, Paige Saez, Colin Beattie, Jen Rhoads, Laura Baldwin, Gabriel Mindel Saloman, Dan S. Wang and many others.

Often situating themselves in public space, or creating an atmosphere wherein the definition of space maybe have an opportunity to redefine itself, Red76 initiatives often utilize overlooked histories and common shared occurrences as a means in creating a framework in which to construct their public inquiries.

Gould is a founding member of MessHall, an experimental social space on the North Side of Chicago. As well he is the editor of the Journal of Radical Shimming, and co-editor, along with John Vitale, of “.......” (dots and quotes), a free arts publication, last sponsored by the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, distributed internationally. In 2006 Gould was one of nine nominees’ for the de Menil collections Walter Hopps Award for Curatorial Achievement.

Along with producing many independent initiatives, Gould and Red76 have engaged in projects commissioned by the Institute of Contemporary Art Philadelphia, the Drawing Center, the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, Printed Matter, Creative Time, the Douglas F. Cooley Memorial Gallery at Reed College, 01 San Jose, and many others.

Currently Gould is a Senior Lecturer at the California College of the Arts and, along with other members of Red76, runs a mobile speakeasy devoted to research into illegalities and alternative economic forms.

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