This is not a paywall You can keep reading for free! At Hyperallergic , we strive to make art more inclusive, so you’ll never hit a paywall when reading our articles. But, as an independent publication, we rely on readers like you to keep our high-quality coverage free and accessible. Please consider joining us as a member to support independent journalism.
Already a member? Sign in here. We rely on readers like you to fund our journalism. If you value our coverage and want to support more of it, consider supporting us as a member.
Join Us LOS ANGELES — A large piece of white nylon stretches between two poles. Artist Gustav Metzger, donning a gas mask, sprays acid at the makeshift canvas. Over the course of his 10-minute film, “Auto-Destructive Art: The Activities of Gustav Metzger” (1965), on view in Gustav Metzger: And Then Came the Environment at Hauser & Wirth, the nylon’s previously taut, painterly surface is torn to shreds, revealing London’s River Thames beyond.
Metzger’s usage of acid calls to mind both the “acid rain” produced by the mixture of toxic debris and rainfall, and the “black rain” that fell on Nagasaki and Hiroshima after the US detonated two atomic bombs in 1945; in one 2009 interview, the artist called the artwork an attack on “the systems of capitalism, but also inevitably the systems of war, the warmongers.” Art and war, abstractly, is also the subject of Cai Guo-Qiang: A Material Odyssey at the USC Pacific Asia Museum. The tw.
