Diego Cortez
Diego Cortez | |
---|---|
Born | James Allan Curtis September 30, 1946 Geneva, Illinois, U.S. |
Died | June 21, 2021 (aged 74) |
Education | Illinois State University (BA) School of the Art Institute of Chicago (MA) |
Movement | No wave |
James Allan Curtis (September 30, 1946 – June 21, 2021),
Early life and education
Cortez was born James Allan Curtis on September 30, 1946, in Geneva, Illinois, to Jean (née Ham) and Allan Curtis. His mother was a manicurist while his father was a warehouse manager at a steel company.[2] Curtis grew up in the nearby town of Wheaton, Illinois. He graduated with a bachelor's degree from the Illinois State University and received a master's degree from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1973. He studied performance art as well as film and video production at the institute with teachers including Avant-garde filmmaker Stan Brakhage and the Korean-American filmmaker Nam June Paik.[2]
Curtis adopted the pseudonym Diego Cortez in 1973 while moving to New York City as a tribute to the Hispanic neighborhood of Chicago where he had lived.[2]
Career
Cortez moved to New York City in 1973, where he worked as a studio assistant to conceptual artist Dennis Oppenheim and later with designer and performance artist Vito Acconci. He went on to embed himself in the music and arts scene in the city while holding multiple jobs including working as a security guard at the Museum of Modern Art.[2][3][4] He also performed with Avant-garde artist Hermann Nitsch and was a founding member of the New York-based artists group Colab.[3][4] In 1978, he co-founded the Mudd Club, a nightclub in the Tribeca neighborhood of Lower Manhattan, with Steve Maas and punk artist and music manager Anya Phillips.[5]
During this period, he also performed with artists Kathy Acker and Laurie Anderson, directed music videos for rock bands Talking Heads and Blondie, and organized showings of works by the singer and songwriter Patti Smith. He also wrote the book Private Elvis, containing photographs of American singer and actor Elvis Presley during Presley's time with the army, that he found in West Germany.[6][2] Cortez was the NYC production advisor to Brian Eno on the no wave record No New York (1978) which was released by Island Records.[7]
In the late 1970s, the avant-garde music and art movement called
Cortez continued to work as an art agent and curator, working with
Cortez was a member of the authentication committee for the estate of Jean-Michel Basquiat, which ceased operation in 2012.[1]
Death
Cortez died from kidney failure at the age of 74 on June 20, 2021, in Burlington, North Carolina. Cortez had been in hospice while living in nearby Saxapahaw, North Carolina.[2] A tribute to Diego Cortez was published in The Brooklyn Rail in October 2021.[10]
Books
- Cortez, Diego; Paulini, Rudolf (1978). Private Elvis. Stuttgart, Ger.: Fey. OCLC 5013567.
- Cortez, Diego; ISBN 978-1576872727
- Basquiat, Jean-Michel; Buchhart, Dieter; Keller, Sam; Gabriel, John William; Partridge, Matthew (2010). Basquiat. Riehen/Basel. )
- Cortez, Diego (2012). Bianca Casady: Daisy Chain. Cheim & Read. ISBN 9780985141028
See also
- Conceptual art
- Colab
- Mudd Club
- Tier 3
- Just Another Asshole
- New wave music
- No wave cinema
- Institutional Critique
- Postmodern art
References
- ^ a b c d Greenberger, Alex (June 21, 2021). "Curator Diego Cortez, Who Helped Launch Basquiat to Fame, Is Dead". ARTnews. Retrieved June 21, 2021.
- ^ ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved June 24, 2021.
- ^ a b Hager, Steve. Art After Midnight: The East Village Scene. St. Matins Press, 1986. p. 26
- ^ a b Alan W. Moore and Marc Miller, eds. ABC No Rio Dinero: The Story of a Lower East Side Art Gallery New York: ABC No Rio with Collaborative Projects, 1985
- ^ Boch, Richard.The Mudd Club, Feral House, 2017, p. 18
- ^ Burger, Jeff (May 10, 1980). "Book Review: Diego Cortez's 'Private Elvis' Offers Revealing Presley Photos". By Jeff Burger. Retrieved August 11, 2022.
- ^ Masters, Marc. No Wave. London: Black Dog Publishing, 2007
- ^ Pearlman, Alison, Unpackaging Art of the 1980s. Chicago: University Of Chicago Press, 2003
- ^ a b Basciano, Oliver (July 14, 2021). "Diego Cortez obituary". The Guardian. Archived from the original on July 14, 2021. Retrieved July 25, 2021.
- ^ [1] Tribute to Diego Cortez published in The Brooklyn Rail
Sources
- Boch, Richard.The Mudd Club. Feral House, 2017.
- Hager, Steve. Art After Midnight: The East Village Scene. St. Matins Press, 1986.
- Masters, Marc. No Wave. London: Black Dog Publishing, 2007. ISBN 978-1-906155-02-5
- Moore, Alan W., and Marc Miller (eds.). ABC No Rio Dinero: The Story of a Lower East Side Art Gallery. New York: Collaborative Projects, 1985
- Pearlman, Alison, Unpackaging Art of the 1980s. Chicago: University Of Chicago Press, 2003.
- Reynolds, Simon. "Contort Yourself: No Wave New York." In Rip It Up and Start Again: Post-punk 1978–84. London: Faber and Faber, Ltd., 2005.
- Taylor, Marvin J. (ed.). The Downtown Book: The New York Art Scene, 1974–1984, foreword by Lynn Gumpert. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006. ISBN 0-691-12286-5