a lecture on Ian Wilson by Krist Gruijthuijsen, new director of KW Institute for Contemporary Art

followed by a conversation with Christian Kobald (Spike)

Dialogue lies at the core of Ian Wilson’s practice. Focusing on spoken language as an art form, the South African artist (born 1940) initially described his work as “oral communication” and later as “discussion”. Wilson’s interest in the concentrated moment in which ideas emerge and are formulated in language is a guiding framework for the first season of Krist Gruijthuijsen’s artistic program at KW, which is taking the his oeuvre as a reflection of its own mission: to explore relationships between the viewer and the viewed – or discussed – and the topical urgency of this interaction.

This lecture is part of the re-opening weekend of KW with a series of exhibitions reflecting on the work of Wilson. In three solo presentations by Hanne Lippard, Adam Pendleton, and Paul Elliman, Wilson’s influential practice is revisited as a framework for exploring the roles of language and communication and the broader significance of interpersonal interaction.

Image: Ian Wilson, Chalk Circle, 1968. Courtesy Galerie Jan Mot, Bruxelles