Bruce Conner: The Afternoon Interviews

by V. Vale (Editor), Natasha Boas (Introduction)

From the late '70s to 2005, V. Vale interviewed Bruce Conner by telephone and in person mostly in the afternoons. Spontaneous yet insightful in his conversation, Conner is revealed as an innovative improvisatory artist whose goal in life seemed to be freedom and the transcendence of hidebound careerist conformity in all its bureaucratic manifestations. Therefore he created art that annihilated boundaries, categories and predictability. These interviews have never been transcribed and made public, until now. Bruce The Afternoon Interviews includes a revelatory introduction by art curator, writer and philosopher Natasha Boas. Boas positions Conner as a key artist of the late 20th- to early 21st-century, profiling Conner as a surprising role model for today's emergent and future artists.

Genres: Art

128 pages, Paperback

Published November 15, 2016

About the author

Japanese-American writer and publisher. He also played keyboards for the later famous power trio Blue Cheer.

In 1977 he started to publish the punk fanzine "Search and destroy" In 1980, he began publication of RE/Search, a tabloid format zine focusing on various counterculture and underground topics.

RE/Search later became always a format for books, of which Vale is a regular contributor.

Reviews

[Bill Hsu · Rating 3 out of 5]

I know Bruce Conner mostly through his work, especially after the amazing SFMOMA retrospective a few years ago. I didn't know he was such a character. Now I do.

[A · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bruce Conner was one of the seminal individuals in my San Francisco life. He introduced me to George Herms, and on two occasions gave me small works of art that he happened to have in his pocket. We never had any conversations that I can remember, but he was a huge supporter, and I hope that I can say that I was the same to him.

This book of conversations is an invaluable look into the person who Bruce Conner was. His conversations with V. Vale (another seminal individual in S.F., and unfortunately one I never met), are candid and full of crazy information one would not otherwise know or even think about. This is one of those books that you don't want to end, so the information can sink in.

Thank you, V. Vale for publishing this intimate look at someone who knew how to live in the mainstream without getting too wet.