Terry Fox was a leading figure in the Bay Area art scene of the late 1960s and 1970s. His work explored issues of the body, time, spirituality, and social protest. Two of Fox’s video and audio works are being presented at BAMPFA in conjunction with Terry Fox: Resonance, a multivenue celebration organized by Dena Beard and Constance Lewallen. Between October 4 and December 14, exhibitions and events will take place at BAMPFA, The Lab, California College of the Arts Wattis Institute, Grace Cathedral, 871 Fine Arts, Cushion Works, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and San Francisco Art Institute libraries. For more information, visit thelab.org.
From October 2 to December 15, 2019, BAMPFA will present on the lower level, Fox’s audio piece, The Labyrinth Scored for the Purrs of 11 Different Cats c. 1977. This piece is part of an extended series Fox produced between 1972 to 1978 that was inspired by the labyrinth at Chartres Cathedral, southwest of Paris. For this sound piece, the artist explained, “I recorded eight continuous minutes of purring from eleven different cats. These were then mixed to follow the exact path of the labyrinth with one cat representing each of the eleven concentric rings, ten seconds of overlapping purrs to indicate each of the thirty-four turns. The tape follows in stereo the path of the labyrinth with the center finally represented by the simultaneous purring of all eleven cats.”
Also on view, from October 1 to 11, will be an excerpt from Fox’s video Children’s Tapes, presented on the hour on BAMPFA’s Addison Street outdoor screen.
