Arman (b. 1928, France – d. 2005, USA)
Le Plein, 1960

A couple of years after Klein’s Le Vide (#482), Arman opens at the same gallery Le Plein – filling up the volume of the gallery with trash.

And then this little sardine can, filled with trash and invitation to the exhibition. This keeps tickling my brain when thinking about the framing. Firstly, how to think about 1500 of such cans in relation to the exhibition – are they “within the frame” as a kind of distributed exhibition, or are they more of ‘merch’, some auxiliary objects that are related but not part of the show. Secondly, to what extent can this work be understood without awareness of Klein’s show? And if Le Vide is crucial for understanding of Le Plein, does it ‘incorporate’ Le Vide within its frame as well? But such thinking would easily lead to inclusion of any art ever made… The frame is inescapably porous…