Ken Friedman

Ken Friedman (1939), produced his first ‘event’, Scrub Piece (involving the cleaning of a public monument), in 1956.

Around 1959 he became interested in Japan and the East (Zen, Japanese art and architecture, Buddhist literature), and in 1961, although he was not clearly defining his activity as ‘art’, he began systematically to realize his little events in many places, public and private.

Friedman: ‘In 1966 I entered into a lengthy friendship and correspondence with Dick Higgins. He suggested that I visit George Maciunas, who was then directing the publications and many of the activities of Fluxus. I joined the Fluxus group in August of 1066.’ (From: FLUXUS, the most radical and experimental art movement of the sixties, Amsterdam, 1979.)

In 2019 Friedman worked on portrait paintings of artists he befriended or admired: 23 PORTRAITS BY KEN FRIEDMAN