Curatorial Intensive alumnus Pat Elifritz, along with Alex Kitnick, Julie Niemi, and David Senior, will speak about the work and enduring influence of artist collective USCO.
The Company of Us (USCO) helped define “intermedia” in the 1960s. Their multichannel environments and events of layered image, language, light, and sound were emblematically psychedelic, but also represented an important moment in arts interdisciplinarity. USCO worked out of a retrofitted church in the Hudson Valley town of Garnerville that also served as a venue, hub, and home. The group was formed in 1963 by poet Gerd Stern, painter Stephen Durkee, and engineer Michael Callahan, with frequent collaborators like Whole Earth Catalog founder Stewart Brand. This talk will consider USCO’s installations and events, their Garnerville home, their relationship with Marshall McLuhan, and their proximity to other countercultural collectives.
This event is free and open to the public. To attend, please RSVP to rsvp@curatorsintl.org with USCO in the subject line.