Jewels from the SSB Collection at the Smithsonian: Part 1
When we got to the Archives of American Art, SSB Board member Danielle Lesniewski and I did not know what to expect. We didn’t have a clue how many boxes I’d donated back in 1990 or what they contained. We knew it was a government research institution—we’d had to register in advance—and that there were lots of rules once we got there: one box at a time, one folder at a time, one piece of paper at a time. No talking. The room was hushed with a few scholars scattered around looking in boxes, taking photographs on their phones, making notes.
We were in luck, the first box we tackled was filled with artist’s correspondence and ephemera and the first folder in that box was Laurie Anderson. SSB had produced For Instants, her first performance on the West Coast at the Otis Art Institute Gallery in March of 1978. We pulled the folder out, and one at a time, we read yellow onion skin carbon copies of correspondence, hand-written notes, and lists, until we came to this—at which point we burst out laughing! Uh oh! We weren’t there 5 minutes and broke the rules. Always a master storyteller, Laurie’s letter—riffing on her experiences down south—says so much about that moment in time and the charm and gentle humor of her creative genius.