George Brecht
1926–2008
Introduction
George Brecht (August 27, 1926 – December 5, 2008), born George Ellis MacDiarmid, was an American conceptual artist and avant-garde composer, as well as a professional chemist who worked as a consultant for companies including Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, and Mobil Oil. He was a key member of, and influence on, Fluxus, the international group of avant-garde artists centred on George Maciunas, having been involved with the group from the first performances in Wiesbaden 1962 until Maciunas' death in 1978.
One of the originators of participatory art, in which the artwork can only be experienced by the active involvement of the viewer, he is most famous for his Event Scores such as Drip Music 1962, and is widely seen as an important precursor to conceptual art. He described his own art as a way of "ensuring that the details of everyday life, the random constellations of objects that surround us, stop going unnoticed."
Wikidata identifier
Q686321
Information from Wikipedia, made available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License . Accessed April 30, 2025.
Country of birth
United States
Roles
Artist, conceptual artist, painter, performance artist, sculptor, writer
ULAN identifier
500045721
Names
George Brecht, George MacDiarmid
Information from the Getty Research Institute's Union List of Artist Names ® (ULAN), made available under the ODC Attribution License. Accessed April 30, 2025.