The Suzanne Geiss Company
76 Grand Street, between Wooster and Greene Streets, SoHo
Through April 20
In the early 1970s Mary Beth Edelson invited some of her friends and associates to direct her in making art. Her goal, strongly influenced by feminism and Jung, was to tap into a collective unconscious; “to meditate on their suggestions, taking that energy and fusing it with my own to come up with a third energy,” as she wrote at the time. The fruits of this project, “22 Others,” were exhibited in 1973 in Washington at the Henri Gallery and the Corcoran Gallery of Art.
That show has been restaged at Suzanne Geiss by the independent curator Tim Goossens. Although the language and imagery here can seem dated, the collaborative ethos behind them feels extraordinarily fresh.
In the main gallery, large black-and-white paintings of water cascading through open doorways accompany bolsterlike soft sculptures. The inspiration for these works was a directive from the New Orleans Museum of Art director John Bullard to “make one of your paintings dimensional.” Elsewhere, an instruction from the sculptor Italo Scanga to “make a painting with honey” results in a sensual wall piece that oozes into a ceramic bowl on the floor.
Over all, the reappearance of “22 Others” reminds us that feminist art making was very much a group effort, one that laid the groundwork for many other collective practices and that often included men. “22 Others” produced, among other things, Ms. Edelson’s most famous work: a poster titled “Some Living American Women Artists/Last Supper” that replaces the heads of Christ and his disciples with those of female artists like Georgia O’Keeffe and Louise Bourgeois. The prompt came from the artist Ed McGowin: “I would like for you to use organized religion as a point of departure.”
A version of this review appeared in print on April 5, 2013, on page C29 of the New York edition with the headline: MARY BETH EDELSON: ‘22 Others’.
