Dear Mr. Muniz,
Please call me Cor. I am an art educator at the University of the Arts Utrecht in the Netherlands and got introduced to your work by a professor of mine (Nelly van der Geest) during my master in Art Education three years ago. Nelly showed us the documentary Waste Land as an inspiration for our essay about creativity and sustainability. The documentary made a big impact, it made me cry and laugh. After graduating I showed it to ‘my’ first year students during the module ‘creative process’. Since then I am a big fan of your work. Not only because of the beauty of your work but also because of the beauty of the process. And beauty here I define according to Stendahl; the promise of happiness.
Last week I was in Shanghai and saw the work of James Turrell. Saw? Maybe ‘felt’ is a better way to describe his work. It was at the Long Museum. After my visit I wanted to buy the book of this exhibition to share with my students and family. Unfortunately it was still not for sale. I was told it will will be published after the show, so they can implement his latest work exhibited at the Long Museum. Quite disappointed I looked around in the bookshop and saw this:
I was attracted to the little note book without the plastic wrapping. To be honest I did not recognize it as your work right away. I opened it and noticed that it had been restored. The cracks in the cover were actually real and now covered by tape. I thought of the many hands that had caused these cracks that so beautifully fitted the cover artwork. And who decided or was ordered to repair this notebook? It felt and looked like ‘The Original” and all the other plastic wrapped ones like ‘perfect’ copies, made in China. I decided I wanted both and put them next to each other:
Writing this letter feels like a victory. In two ways. Yesterday my 20 year old son called ‘Made in China’ my first art work. Second is writing you this letter. Therefor I had to find your email address. And what happened? I saw this work on your homepage;
Yesterday I got this essay about Piet Mondriaan’s final, unfinished work. It’s about how it would have looked like if Mondriaan could have finished it. But how unfinished was his masterpiece actually? Mondriaan is actually the artist I did my master thesis on.
You probably know the title of this work?
Yes indeed. VIKtory Boogie Woogie (New York, 1942-1944)
I would love to show it to you. It’s in The Hague, The Netherlands.
As a teacher I will never be able to buy your work. And here I feel we have something in common because you also can’t ‘buy’ my work. You can get it. I will give you my original ‘Made in China’ and you give me an original artwork of yourself that you think that will make me happy.
Till then I will keep your ‘Made in China’.
Kind regards,
Cor Noltee
cornoltee@mac.com