Fluxus

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Fluxus (from "to flow") is an art movement noted for the blending of different artistic disciplines, primarily visual art but also music and literature. Fluxus was loosely organized in 1962 by George Maciunas (1931-78), a Lithuanian-American artist who had moved to Germany to escape his creditors, along with his fellow Lithuanian and personal friend, Almus Salcius. Besides America and Europe, Fluxus also took root in Japan.

Among its associates were Joseph Beuys, Dick Higgins, Nam June Paik and Yoko Ono who explored media ranging from performance art to poetry to experimental music to film. They took the stance of opposition to the ideas of tradition and professionalism in the arts of their time, the Fluxus group shifted the emphasis from what an artist makes to the artist's personality, actions, and opinions. Throughout the 1960s and '70s (their most active period) they staged "action" events, engaged in politics and public speaking, and produced sculptural works featuring unconventional materials. Their radically untraditional works included, for example, the video art of Nam June Paik and the performance art of Beuys. The often playful style of Fluxus artists led to their being considered by some little more than a group of pranksters in their early years. Fluxus has also been compared to Dada and aspects of Pop Art and is seen as the starting point of mail art.

Most notorious are the Fluxus performance pieces or "Event Scores" such as George Brecht's Drip Music. Fluxus artists differentiate Event Scores from "happenings" which they called Flux Events. Whereas Happenings were meant to blur the lines between performer and audience, performance and reality, Fluxus performances were sometimes one-liners and sight gags. The performances sought to elevate the banal and dissemble the high culture of serious music and art.

Marcel Duchamp, Allan Kaprow (who is credited as the creator of the first "happenings"), and John Cage were highly influential to Fluxus.

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