Remarks on Color, 1994
Single-channel video/sound installation
Video projector, two speakers, one DVD player and one DVD (color; stereo sound)
Dimensions: projection approx. 9 h. x 12 w. ft. (2.7 x 3.7 m.)
Edition of five and one artist’s proof
Note: A German version of this work entitled Bemerkungen über die Farben and a Spanish version entitled Observaciones sobre los colores also exist in an edition of five and one artist’s proof, and unique exhibition versions have been recorded in French and Portuguese.
Remarks on Color consists of a single video projection in which an eight year old child (Gary Hill’s daughter, Anastasia Hill) reads Wittgenstein’s Remarks on Color, Part 1, consisting of 88 segments, in real time over a period of 45 minutes. Hill first modified the book by replacing all philosophical, psychological and scientific terms as well as proper names with phonetically spelled versions and then asked Anastasia to negotiate every word the best she could. Consequently the meaning and inflections of pitch and pauses go “in and out of sync” with unexpected turns. Sometimes specific words are occasionally transposed, with “five-sided angles” becoming “five-sided angels,” and “now” replacing “know,” etc. The set, the child’s clothing and hair color, and the bright red book itself become visual references throughout a reading where the reader/viewer experience ‘color,’ ‘language’ and ‘play’ in a multiplicity of ways.
An example of this work was exhibited for the first time as part of “Imagining the Brain Closer than the Eyes,” at the Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Öffentliche Kunstsammlung Basel, Basel, Switzerland, October 29, 1994 – January 29, 1995.
“Gary Hill,” (traveling exhibition organized by the Henry Art Gallery, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington), Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, California, December 19, 1994 – March 12, 1995; Guggenheim Museum SoHo, New York, New York, May 11 – August 20, 1995.
“Private/Public: ARS ’95 Helsinki,” Museum of Contemporary Art, Finnish National Gallery, Helsinki, Finland, February 11 – May 28, 1995.
“Gary Hill: Remarks on Color,” Fundació “la Caixa,” Barcelona, Spain, November 30 – December 24, 1995.
Solo exhibition. Donald Young Gallery, Seattle, Washington, May 2 – June 22, 1996.
“Le Printemps de Cahors: Photographie & Arts Visuels,” Cahors, France, June 14 – July 7, 1996; Portalen Contemporary Art Center, Copenhagen, Denmark, August 16 – September 29, 1996.
Center for Contemporary Art, Ujazdowski Castle, Warsaw, Poland, December 1, 1997 – January 11, 1998.
Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal, Quebec, Canada, January 30 – May 3, 1998.
“Silent Treatment,” Aspen Art Museum, Aspen, Colorado, December 17, 1998 – February 14, 1999.
“Umedalen Skulptur 99,” Organized by Galleri Stefan Andersson, Umeå, Sweden, June 5 – September 5, 1999.
“BOOK/ENDS WIRED: Electronic Media at the Arts Center,” Capital Region Arts Center, Troy, New York, September 15 – November 2, 2000.
“Remarks on Color,” Sean Kelly Gallery, New York, New York, June 1 – July 26, 2002.
“Gary Hill / Bruce Nauman: International New Media Art,” National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, Australia, December 14, 2002 – March 9, 2003.
“Gary Hill: Remarks on Color,” Philadelphia Museum of Art, Video Gallery, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, April 20 – June 13, 2004.
“UBS Openings: Tate Modern Collection,” Tate Modern, London, England, May 23, 2006 – May 2007.
2nd Moscow Biennale of Contemporary Art, Moscow, Russia, March 1 – April 1, 2007.
“Hear With Your Eyes: Collection of Contemporary Art Fundacion ‘la Caixa’,” CaixaForum, Barcelona, Spain, March 15 – May 6, 2007.
“De L’Écriture,” Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal, Canada, April 21 – October 8, 2007.
“Glossodelic Attractors (part two),” The Henry Art Gallery, Seattle, WA, March 30 – September 16, 2012.
"Reading Exercises," Leonard and Bina Ellen Art Gallery, Concordia University, Montreal, Canada, November 19, 2015 — January 23, 2016.
"Collected by Thea Westreich Wagner and Ethan Wagner," Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York, November 20, 2015 — March 6, 2016.
"The Westreich Wagner Collection," Centre Pompidou, Paris, France, June 10, 2016 — February 6, 2017.
“After Babel: part 2 of the trilogy: The Unwritten Library,” Megaron | Annex M, Athens, Greece, July 10 — September 16, 2018 "Gary Hill: Momentombs," Suwon Art Museum, Suwon, Korea, November 26, 2019 — March 8, 2020Vischer, Theodora, ed. Gary Hill: Imagining the Brain Closer than the Eyes. Basel: Museum für Gegenwartskunst; Ostfildern: Cantz, 1995, pp. 14, 23, 24, 34 – 36, 62, 67 – 70, 115. (In German: Gary Hill: Arbeit am Video. Basel: Museum für Gegenwartskunst; Ostfildern: Cantz, 1995, pp. 14, 24, 25, 37, 72 – 74, 76, 120.)
Private/Public ARS ‘95 Helsinki. Helsinki: Museum of Contemporary Art, 1995, pp. 70 – 77.
3e biennale d’art cotemporain de lyon: installation, cinéma, vidéo, informatique. Paris: Réunion des musées nationaux, Biennale d’art contemporain, Paris, 1995, p. 257.
Greene, David A. “Gary Hill at Museum of Contemporary Art.” Art Issues (March/April 1995), p. 39.
Gayer, John. “ARS 95 Ateneum and City Sites, Helsinki.” C Magazine 46 (June/Summer 1995), pp. 35, 36.
“Art: Alternative Programming.” The New Yorker (June 12, 1995).
Glueck, Grace. “Turn On, Tune In and Drop By: Video Art’s Come a Long Way.” The New York Observer (July 24, 1995).
Danto, Arthur. “Art.” The Nation 261, 7 (September 11, 1995), pp. 248, 249.
Beckmann, Angelika. “Gary Hill.” European Photography 58, 16, 2 (Fall 1995), pp. 63, 67.
Lestocart, Louis-José. “Gary Hill: Surfer sur le medium / Surfing the Medium.” art press 210 (February 1996), p. 20, 23.
Fredericksen, Eric. “Gary Hill at Donald Young. Where am I?” The Stranger, Seattle 5, 34 (May 15, 1996).
Mayer, Marc. Being and Time: The Emergence of Video Projection. Buffalo, New York: Albright-Knox Art Gallery, 1996, pp. 43, 44.
Printemps de Cahors 1996. Paris: Fragments, 1996, pp. 18, 19.
Young, Lisa Jaye. “Electronic Verses: Reading the Body vs. Touching the Text,” Performing Arts Journal 52, 18, 1 (January 1996), pp. 37, 38.
Farr, Sheila. “Thinking man’s video. Art: Gary Hill’s video installations achieve pure thought.” Seattle Weekly (May 22, 1996), p. 21.
Dantas, Marcello. Gary Hill: O lugar do outro/where the other takes place. Rio de Janeiro: Magnetoscópio, 1997, pp. 5, 6, 87.
Quasha, George and Charles Stein. Tall Ships. Gary Hill’s Projective Installations 2. Barrytown, New York: Station Hill Arts, 1997, pp. 7, 8.
Quasha, George and Charles Stein. Viewer. Gary Hill’s Projective Installations 3. Barrytown, New York: Station Hill Arts, 1997, p. 9.
The Multimedia and Cultural Revolution. Tokyo: NTT Intercommunication Center, 1997, p. 130.
Hürzeler, Catherine. “Kann man auf abstrakte Weise surfen? Ein Gespräch mit dem Videokünstler Gary Hill.” Das Kunst-Bulletin 9 (September 1997), pp. 15, 18.
Der elektronische Raum: 15 Positionen zur Medienkunst. Bonn: Kunst- und Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Dueuschland, 1998, pp. 155 – 158.
Gary Hill: Midnight Crossing. (Warsaw: Center for Contemporary Art, Ujazdowski Castle, 1998), pp. 148, 159. (In Polish.)
Bélisle, Josée. Gary Hill. Montreal: Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal, 1998, pp. 9, 10, 11, 12, 16, 36.
Silent Treatment: Projecting Narrative. Program notes. Aspen, Colorado: Aspen Art Museum, 1998, unpaginated.
Aquin, Stephanie. “Gary Hill – Vague de fond.” Voir, Montreal (February 12, 1998), p. 25.
Tougas, Colette. “Gary Hill. Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal, 30 janvier – 26 avril.” Parachute 90 (April - June 1998), p. 44.
Bellemare-Brière, Véronique. “Gary Hill – La vidéo reine au MAC.” Séquences, Montreal 196 (May – June 1998), p. 55.
La Chance, Michaël. “Vidéognose.” Spirale, Montreal (May – June 1998), pp. 13, 14.
Sarrazin, Stephen. “Things Fall Apart: Gary Hill & Meg Stuart (with Damaged Goods) ‘Splayed Mind Out’/Gary Hill: Installations and Videotapes.” Intercommunication 25 (Summer 1998), p. 83.
Provencher, Louise. “Catastrophe(s) en ou le bégaiement du temps,” Espace 44, Montreal (Summer 1998), p. 26.
Bellemare-Brière, Véronique. “La vidéo s’éclate.” Esse, Montreal 4 (1998), p. 5.
“Liminal Performance: Gary Hill in Conversation with George Quasha and Charles Stein,” PAJ (Performing Arts Journal) No. 58, Vol. XX, No. 1 (January 1998), p. 10, 14.
Umedalen Skulptur 99. Umeå, Sweden: Galleri Stefan Andersson, 1999, pp. 12, 13.
Rewind to the Future. Bonn: Bonner Kunstverein, 1999, pp. 24, 78 – 79, 161, 182 – 183.
Marclay, Christian and Gary Hill. “Christian Marclay / Gary Hill: Conversation,” Annandale (Bard College), Vol. 139, No. 1 (Spring 2000), p. 9.
São Luís Castro and Inês Gomes. Dificuldades de Aprendizagem da Língua Materna. Lisboa: Universidade Aberta, 2000. (book cover)
Morgan, Robert C., ed. Gary Hill. Baltimore: PAJ Books / The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000, pp. 233, 251, 252.
Gary Hill en Argentina: textos, ensayos, dialogos. Buenos Aires: Centro Cultural Recoleta, 2000, p. 32.
Gary Hill: Instalaciones. Córdoba: Ediciones Museo Caraffa, 2000, pp. 40, 41, 55.
Lageira, Jacinto. Des premiers mots aux derniers silences in Gary Hill: Around & About: A Performative View. Paris: Éditions du Regard, 2001, pp. 12.
Quasha, George and Charles Stein. La performance elle-même in Gary Hill: Around & About: A Performative View. Paris: Éditions du Regard, 2001, pp. 27, 37, 51, 54, 101.
Riemschneider, Burkhard and Uta Grosenick, eds. Art Now. Cologne: Taschen, 2001, pp. 68 – 69.
Estep, Jan. “Transcendental Twaddle: Saying Wittgenstein.” New Art Examiner 29, 3 (January – February 2002), pp. 50 – 57.
Gary Hill: Selected Works and catalogue raisonné. (Wolfsburg: Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg, 2002), pp. 12, 181, 182, 183.
Zutter, Jörg, ed. Gary Hill / Bruce Nauman: International New Media Art. Sydney: National Gallery of Australia, 2002, pp. 12, 25 – 26, 31 (photo). (Includes George Quasha’s essay: “Gary Hill’s Art of the Threshold.”) Note: Jörg Zutter’s essay “Gary Hill / Bruce Nauman: International New Media Art” reprinted in: artonview No. 32 (Summer 2002 – 2003), pp. 6 – 11.
Barro, David. Gary Hill: Poeta da percepção, poet of perception, poeta de la percepción. In Portuguese, Spanish and English. Porto: Mimesis, 2003, pp. 14, 15, 25, 36, 37, 38 – 39, 57, 58, 60.
Shaw, Jeffrey and Peter Weibel, eds. Future Cinema: The Cinematic Imaginary after Film. Karlsruhe: ZKM and Cambridge: MIT Press, 2003, pp. 307.
Diez, Renato. “Gary Hill: Immagini contro parole.” Arte 380 (April 2005), pp. 98 – 104.
Zwingenberger, Jeanette. “Gary Hill, quand penser c’est voir.” L’Oeil 555 (February 2004), pp. 24 – 25.
2 Moscow Biennale of Contemporary Art: Footnotes on Geopolitics, Market and Amnesia. Moscow: Moscow Biennale Art Foundation, 2007, pp. 40 – 41, 217.
Michel, Régis. L’oeil – écran ou la nouvelle image: 100 vidéos pour repenser le monde. Luxembourg: Casino Luxembourg – Forum d’art contemporain, 2007, pp. cover, 120 – 122, 424.
Spielmann, Yvonne. Video: The Reflexive Medium. Cambridge: The MIT Press, 2008, pp. 252 (photo only)
Quasha, George and Charles Stein. An Art of Limina: Gary Hill’s Works and Writings. Barcelona: Ediciones Polígrafa, 2009, pp. 275, 284, 311, 329, 331, 337 – 339, 445, 589, 605, 606, 612.
Ramos, María Elena. Gary Hill. Caracas: Centro Cultural Chacao, 2009 (in Spanish), pp. 11 – 12, 14 – 17.
Velasco, Suzana. “Linguagem Física.” O Globo. (July 20, 2009), p. 1 (Segundo Caderno).
Copeland, Colette. “Rooted in the Experiential: A Conversation with Gary Hill.” Afterimage, 37, 3 (November/December 2009), pp. 20.
Gary Hill: Viewer. Moscow: GMG Gallery, 2010 (in Russian and English), pp. 34, 35.
Ludwig Wittgenstein, Remarks on Color, written in 1951. The bilingual edition (English/German), translated by Linda L. McAlister and Margarete Schattle, which was used for the work, was edited by G.E.M. Anscombe and published by Basil Blackwell, Oxford, in 1978.