Bruce Nauman

1941: Born Dec. 6, Fort Wayne, Ind. 1960: Enters University of Wisconsin, Madison, where he studies mathematics, physics and art. 1964-66: Initially a painter, abandons the medium after entering graduate school at UC Davis, begins working in performance, sculpture and film. 1966: Moves to San Francisco. First solo exhibition at Nicholas Wilder Gallery, Los Angeles. 1968: First solo exhibition in New York at the Leo Castelli Gallery. 1969: Moves to Pasadena.

SAN DIEGO -- "The True Artist Helps the World by Revealing Mystic Truths." So wrote Bruce Nauman in a colorful neon spiral in 1967. Pretty wry, to make such a romantic sentiment gleam like a beer ad. But Nauman's self-reflexive, subversive definition of his own enterprise makes perfect sense in the shape of a spiral -- dynamic, continuous and conspicuously lacking closure. Punster, sage, tease, oracle -- Nauman has long made some of the most revealing work around, both mystic and mundane.

Writer Will D. Campbell made the observation that "a man who understands the nature of tragedy can never take sides." Bruce Nauman's art is rooted in that kind of grasp of the big picture. There's a detached compassion to his work--and a grim gallows humor as well--and he offers no solutions or advice about the human predicaments he explores. Rather, he simply studies them with a clinical eye.

Except for one small group of previously unknown drawings, most of the works in the smashing exhibition "A Rose Has No Teeth: Bruce Nauman in the 1960s" are familiar. How could they not be? Nauman is among the critical American artists of the last four decades, one whose work has fundamentally shaped our idea of what art is today. Still, the handsome show at the Berkeley Art Museum through April 15 is more than just a compendium of early hits, made from 1964 to 1969.

"A Rose Has No Teeth: Bruce Nauman in the 1960s" is on view at the UC Berkeley Art Museum through April 15. * Bruce Nauman once did an installation in which, just as you catch a glimpse of yourself on a video monitor when you enter, the screen goes blank. (The image is a delayed feed from a camera outside the entrance.) This piece is a perfect distillation of his idea that all art is ephemeral, and so are you. A lot of Nauman's art has been a similar disappearing act.

Near as I can figure, Bruce Nauman is the only artist ever to have made convincing works of art using holograms. Many have tried, all have failed. Except him. * What's more, Nauman used holography only twice (in 1968 and 1969). Not one to invest his artistic capital in any particular medium, he's the kind of artist who'll use whatever works in a given situation--steel, wax, concrete, neon, video, felt, fiberglass.

Artist Bruce Nauman lets out a hearty laugh when he hears that Adam Gopnik, art critic for the New Yorker, has described him as "the puritan conscience of the American avant-garde." "That's pretty funny," says a clearly amused Nauman, adding, "but it's true that I do think art has a moral responsibility--and maybe that's the puritan in me talking. Whatever the reason, it's very hard for me to take the easy way--I don't trust the easy way."

A principal convention of mod ern culture says that true art asserts individual identity, which is hidden behind a surface facade that is, in fact, a mere illusion. So, the artist's job is to go beyond outward appearance to reveal that hidden self.

From 1972 until it gradually pooped out sometime in '78 or '79, there was a standing weekly artists' basketball game. We'd meet every Sunday at 10 a.m. on the Santa Monica High School outdoor courts, 4th Street and Pico. We'd play for about two hours, under the blistering sun, or through puddles left by Saturday night's rain. Some of the guys were Westside boys: Bob Smith, Jud Fine, occasionally Doug Wheeler and very occasionally Bill Wegman.

American artist Bruce Nauman is one of the five winners of the 16th annual Praemium Imperiale art awards officially announced Tuesday at the Japanese Embassy in Berlin. The awards carry prizes of 15 million yen -- approximately $135,000 in U.S. dollars -- and recognize a lifetime achievement in arts categories that are not covered by the Nobel Prize.

"A Rose Has No Teeth: Bruce Nauman in the 1960s" is on view at the UC Berkeley Art Museum through April 15. * Bruce Nauman once did an installation in which, just as you catch a glimpse of yourself on a video monitor when you enter, the screen goes blank. (The image is a delayed feed from a camera outside the entrance.) This piece is a perfect distillation of his idea that all art is ephemeral, and so are you. A lot of Nauman's art has been a similar disappearing act.

It is one of the world's biggest interior art spaces, and American artist Bruce Nauman has filled it with nothing -- nothing, that is, except noise. Nauman, 62, who says his sound works are inspired by avant-garde composer John Cage, has created what amounts to a sonic shower in the cathedral-sized Turbine Hall of London's Tate Modern art gallery.

American artist Bruce Nauman is one of the five winners of the 16th annual Praemium Imperiale art awards officially announced Tuesday at the Japanese Embassy in Berlin. The awards carry prizes of 15 million yen -- approximately $135,000 in U.S. dollars -- and recognize a lifetime achievement in arts categories that are not covered by the Nobel Prize.

Regarding Ernest Fleischmann's article, "Arts Are at the Nation's Soul" (Calendar, Feb. 20): From time immemorial, art flourished when it was supported and languished when not. The support came from the wealthy patrons, the church, the monarchy, the feudal lords, from Pericles, from the Medicis, from the rich literati and so on. All but for a price. The art had to please the donors, the sponsors, the mentors. When not, the cornucopia dried up. Now, in modern societies, we have a new kind of patronage, the educated public that insists on getting its tax dollar's worth.

A principal convention of mod ern culture says that true art asserts individual identity, which is hidden behind a surface facade that is, in fact, a mere illusion. So, the artist's job is to go beyond outward appearance to reveal that hidden self.

I have always enjoyed Peter Plagens' fanciful and witty writing. But I have never considered his opinions the definitive statement of contemporary art history. I'd like to expand on his use of the theater, cast-of-characters and basketball metaphors in his article on Bruce Nauman ("An Artist and His Roots," July 17): The first act of my play would be over in an instant. Donald Judd and Ed Kienholz would be dead. Bruce Nauman, his retrospective over, would fade away and disappear in a neon-lit stage.

I have always enjoyed Peter Plagens' fanciful and witty writing. But I have never considered his opinions the definitive statement of contemporary art history. I'd like to expand on his use of the theater, cast-of-characters and basketball metaphors in his article on Bruce Nauman ("An Artist and His Roots," July 17): The first act of my play would be over in an instant. Donald Judd and Ed Kienholz would be dead. Bruce Nauman, his retrospective over, would fade away and disappear in a neon-lit stage.

It is one of the world's biggest interior art spaces, and American artist Bruce Nauman has filled it with nothing -- nothing, that is, except noise. Nauman, 62, who says his sound works are inspired by avant-garde composer John Cage, has created what amounts to a sonic shower in the cathedral-sized Turbine Hall of London's Tate Modern art gallery.

Near as I can figure, Bruce Nauman is the only artist ever to have made convincing works of art using holograms. Many have tried, all have failed. Except him. * What's more, Nauman used holography only twice (in 1968 and 1969). Not one to invest his artistic capital in any particular medium, he's the kind of artist who'll use whatever works in a given situation--steel, wax, concrete, neon, video, felt, fiberglass.

In Los Angeles, art's first generation spanned the late 1950s to the early 1970s. First there was Assemblage, Pop and the Light and Space artists in Venice. Then there was Bruce Nauman. The first group included many artists--among them Billy Al Bengston, Ed Ruscha, Robert Irwin and James Turrell--who defined a clean, serene image of their city. Nauman, in reaction, made art that questions everything, from space, to light, to words to the meaning of life.