''I Like America and America Likes Me'', also known as ''Coyote'', was a 1974 performance by conceptual artist
Joseph Beuys
Joseph Heinrich Beuys ( , ; 12 May 1921 – 23 January 1986) was a German artist, teacher, performance artist, and art theorist whose work reflected concepts of humanism, sociology, and anthroposophy. He was a founder of a provocative art mov ...
.
Description
In 1974, the German conceptual artist landed in a New York City airport whereupon assistants wrapped him in felt and brought him to the René Block Gallery in
SoHo
Soho is an area of the City of Westminster, part of the West End of London. Originally a fashionable district for the aristocracy, it has been one of the main entertainment districts in the capital since the 19th century.
The area was develo ...
in an ambulance. There Beuys spent three consecutive days, for eight hours a day, living with a live
coyote. Beuys attempted to connect with the animal by repeating symbolic gestures such as throwing leather gloves, gesticulating with a cane, and cloaking himself like a shepherd with the cane sticking out. The coyote was docile and occasionally hostile, tugging at the artist's felt.
Beuys occasionally played a
triangle
A triangle is a polygon with three edges and three vertices. It is one of the basic shapes in geometry. A triangle with vertices ''A'', ''B'', and ''C'' is denoted \triangle ABC.
In Euclidean geometry, any three points, when non- colline ...
and a
tape recording
An audio tape recorder, also known as a tape deck, tape player or tape machine or simply a tape recorder, is a sound recording and reproduction device that records and plays back sounds usually using magnetic tape for storage. In its present ...
of
turbine
A turbine ( or ) (from the Greek , ''tyrbē'', or Latin ''turbo'', meaning vortex) is a rotary mechanical device that extracts energy from a fluid flow and converts it into useful work. The work produced by a turbine can be used for generating ...
s.
At the end of the performance, Beuys, still wrapped in felt, returned home in the same manner whence he came.
Caroline Tisdall, Beuys's collaborator and travel companion, documented the performance in black and white photographs.
Symbolism
At the time of this performance, Beuys was already well known as a provocative German visual artist who used materials—felt and animal fat—based on his mythologized personal history: As a downed
fighter pilot, a
Tartar tribesman nursed Beuys back to health by insulating him in those materials. The felt in which Beuys wrapped himself during ''I Like America and America Likes Me'' was a therapeutic and shamanic symbol for Beuys through which he and his "social sculptures" (such as this performance) sought to heal societal psychic wounds.
During this time, Beuys saw the United States as divided over
its involvement in the Vietnam War and
its racial divisions and subjugation, and wanted his performance to address the split between Native and European intelligence, the latter being more
materialistic,
mechanistic, and
positivistic. His selection of the coyote, a Native American symbol of transformation and trickery, invoked its Native
creation myth of the Promethean teacher teaching humans to survive. Whereas settlers viewed coyotes as an aggressive predator to be exterminated, to Beuys, the coyote symbolized America's spirit. Beuys felt that America needed to reckon with the coyote to lift its trauma. It was Beuys's first trip to the United States. He had refused prior invitations based on American involvement in the Vietnam War, but agreed to travel given the country's exit from the war.
The performance's title, ''I Like America and America Likes Me'', also recalls the
7-Up
7 Up (stylized as 7up outside North America) is an American brand of lemon-lime-flavored non-caffeinated soft drink. The brand and formula are owned by Keurig Dr Pepper although the beverage is internationally distributed by PepsiCo. 7 Up comp ...
soda advertising slogan, "You like it. It likes you." The piece is also known as ''Coyote''.
Reception and legacy
The performance's lesson, wrote ''Artsy'', is that American societal trauma can only be healed through direct communication.
''Artsy'' wrote that the piece's title, evoking the
melting pot metaphor for
Americanization
Americanization or Americanisation (see spelling differences) is the influence of American culture and business on other countries outside the United States of America, including their media, cuisine, business practices, popular culture, te ...
, stood in contrast with the divisions Beuys saw in America.
Photographs from the performance were shown at the Edinburgh Festival, where they greatly affected the future artist
Jimmy Boyle.
The curator
RoseLee Goldberg too found the photographs poetic, only to be changed by a video of the performance in which she saw the sadness of the coyote. Artifacts from the performance were later exhibited in "german: label=none, Neues vom Coyoten" ("News from the Coyote") at the Ronald Feldman Gallery.
References
Further reading
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Joseph Beuyspp. 177–179
{{Portal bar, Visual arts
1974 in art
1970s photographs
May 1974 events in the United States
Works by Joseph Beuys
Performances