The D’Amico Gowanus Laboratory Collective is a group of artists, performers, writers and educators who develop experiential workshops, events and projects inspired by the life and work of Victor D’Amico, an often-forgotten visionary art thinker and educator who ran the Museum of Modern Art Department of Education from 1937 – 1969, and his wife Mabel, an artist and educator.
Through a series of laboratory workshops, the Collective will examine D’Amico’s techniques and activate his archive (recently relocated to MoMA); place his work in historical context; and apply his multi-faceted legacy to the contemporary Gowanus community. The Collective will work closely with Wendy Woon, Deputy Director of the MoMA Education Department, as they create new ways of informing art education and practice.
Victor D’Amico believed fervently that art is a human necessity that should be experienced by all. His inclusive, experiential, exploratory ideas are profoundly important today when art has drifted away from this essential function. His work was based on early Modernist ideas that promoted art as a holistic lifestyle and stressed the importance of democratic principles and broad access. Through his People’s Art Center, Children’s Art Carnival and War Veteran’s Art Center at MoMA, D’Amico’s work touched countless lives.
D’Amico developed modular, interactive tools, that he called “motivations,” designed to stimulate the creative process through playful exposure to color, light, movement and texture. “Motivations” could also take the form of descriptive texts or poetry, or experiential walks. Individuals were then given art materials and asked to create artwork in environments specially designed by D’Amico.
The Collective’s work will not be a dry repository or simply replicate D’Amico’s work. Rather it will use D’Amico’s ideas as an improvisational stepping off point to develop new creative projects that are adapted to contemporary needs. The program will deepen our connection to our community and place by enabling us reach new Gowanus audiences with a focus on neighborhoods underserved by the art community.
After retiring from MoMA in 1969, D’Amico’s programs were disbanded. He retreated to Long Island taking his tools and archives with him. He spent the last twenty years of his life teaching on a WW I navy barge converted into a community art studio. Today the barge, now the Victor D’Amico Institute of Art, continues to uphold D’Amico’s legacy. Victor and Mabel built by hand a small modernist house near the barge which is preserved today as a house museum.
