Two previously unpublished interviews with Jim Dine, about his performances in New York City in the early 1960s, an important period in his career that the artist has so far rarely discussed.
This publication brings together two interviews with Jim Dine conducted by Annalisa Rimmaudo and Didier Mathieu on two different occasions.
The first part is the transcript of the meeting "Jim Dine. A propos de ses Environments et Performances" that took place at the École nationale supérieure d'art in Limoges on March 18, 2019.
The second part corresponds to the recording of a telephone conversation with the artist that took place on April 19 and 20, 2020.
The first interview has a public, collective dimension: it took place in a lecture hall in front of a large audience consisting mainly of students. Jim Dine, like his interlocutors, spoke into a microphone and was filmed.
The second is characterised by the intimacy of the telephone conversation. Jim Dine speaks on the telephone seated in the living room of his home, as his interlocutors do. Although aware of the recording, he is not confronted with a scene and the mechanisms that the device activates.
Jim Dine (born 1935 in Cincinnati, Ohio), pioneer of the happening and associated with the Pop Art movement, has always followed a unique path. He experiments extensively with different techniques, working with wood, lithography, photography, metal, stone and paint. The tool and the creative process are just as important as the finished work. The artist explores the themes of the self, the body and memory, drawing on a personal iconography made up of hearts, veins, skulls, Pinocchio and tools.
