Robert Watts
Directing
Biography
Robert Marshall Watts (1923–1988) was an American artist best known for his work as a member of the international group of artists Fluxus. Born in Burlington, Iowa June 14, 1923, he became Professor of Art at Douglass College, Rutgers University, New Jersey in 1953, a post he kept until 1984. In the 1950s, he was in close contact with other teachers at Rutgers including Allan Kaprow, Geoffrey Hendricks, and Roy Lichtenstein. This has led some critics to claim that pop art and conceptual art began at Rutgers. He organised the proto-fluxus Yam Festival, May 1963 with George Brecht, and was one of the main protagonists, along with George Maciunas, in turning SoHo, New York, into an artist's quarter. He died September 2, 1988, of lung cancer in Martins Creek, Pennsylvania.
Known For
One Rolls-Royce belongs to three vastly different owners, starting with Lord Charles, who buys the car for his wife as an anniversary present. The next owner is Paolo Maltese, a mafioso who purchases the car during a trip to Italy and leaves it with his girlfriend while he returns to Chicago. Finally, the car is owned by American widow Gerda, who joins the Yugoslavian resistance against the invading Nazis.
The Yellow Rolls-Royce
On March 24, 1979, The Kitchen presented a two-part program dedicated to the work of various Fluxus artists. The programming began with the premiere of Alison Knowles’s “Natural Assemblages and the True Crow.” For the piece, Knowles engaged in a dialogue with her own taped voice, which read aloud selections from various natural history books. Simultaneously, violinist Michael Goldstein provided an improvised score while dancer Jessie Higgins executed a number of one-movement phrases by following instructions on index cards. The second part of the night’s programming consisted of forty rapid performances—most sixty seconds or less—by various Fluxus members, including Yoko Ono, George Brecht, La Monte Young, and Nam June Paik. Ken Friedman and Larry Miller coordinated this portion of the event.
Flux-Concert
X-ray sequence of mouth and throat; eating, salivating, speaking.
Trace No. 24
Feature-length compilation program presenting 37 out of 41 original fluxfilms produced and directed in the 1960s by Fluxus artists, including George Maciunas, Nam June Paik, Yoko Ono, Robert Watts, Paul Sharits, et al.
Fluxfilm Anthology 1962-1970
Begins with a shot of a demarcation line on an asphalt tennis court. A hand points to the distant landscape, then numbers 408 and 409 appear on a female torso.
Trace No. 23
Begins with a picture of Marilyn Monroe, then shifts to a female body, shot from belly button down, which is wriggling under piles of cellophane.