Cut-Ups: William S. Burroughs, 1914 - 2014

Cut-Ups: William S. Burroughs, 1914 - 2014

Friday, Nov 07, 2014 - Friday, Dec 12, 2014

Location:
Boo-Hooray (Canal Street)
 265 Canal Street, Suite 601
New York, NY 10013

Boo-Hooray, in collaboration with Emory University, is presenting a William S. Burroughs centenary exhibition dedicated to the Cut-Up technique.

On view will be hand-edited typescript drafts from the Nova Trilogy, rarely seen publications like the mimeographed newsletter The Burrough and the Sigma Portfolio, alongside correspondence with Brion Gysin, vinyl releases, as well as the original cut-up paper components that went on form his novels.

The Cut-Ups began in October of 1959, when Brion Gysin sliced through a pile of newspapers with his Stanley knife, his intention had been to "cut mounts for his water colours" and the newspapers were there simply to protect his desktop. However, while observing the patterns created by the different layers of cut paper he decided to reshuffle them to compose a new narrative. Finding the result most amusing, he showed them to his friend and colleague William Burroughs. Burroughs realized Gysin had inadvertently opened a door that led not only to an artistic breakthrough, but also to a different way of seeing the world and processing/interpreting time.

Heavily influenced by the Dadaist movement, this serendipitous realization would have a profound effect on the world while simultaneously destroying conventional notions of time, space and linear narrative.

BOO-HOORAY exhibits both at home in New York City as well as internationally. We also stage collaborative exhibitions with the Hayward Gallery and Rough Trade in London, Tsutaya Daikanyama, Hysteric Glamour, and United Arrows in Tokyo, Galleri Operatingplace in Stockholm, Colette in Paris, PopMontreal in Montreal, Mishka Los Angeles, Printed Matter at both MOCA/LA and PS1/NYC, and Gavin Brown’s Enterprise, the New York Public Library, the Grolier Club, and Milk Gallery in New York.

Boo-Hooray exhibitions have included shows featuring Larry Clark, The Velvet Underground, Ray Johnson, Afrika Bambaataa, Jonas Mekas, Ed Sanders, Linder Sterling and Jon Savage, Spencer Sweeney, Houston Rap, private press vinyl, Wallace Berman, anarcho-punk group Crass, Jason Polan, Jack Smith, cult-filmmaker Ed Wood, and Situationist Times editor Jacqueline de Jong.

The exhibitions are drawn from cultural archives that Boo-Hooray excavates, organizes, and places in institutions such as Columbia University’s Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Cornell University’s Division of Rare Manuscript Collections, Yale University’s Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, and the University of Oxford’s Bodleian Library.