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Collage of five diverse artworks from the Hammer Museum Collections side by side. From left to right: 1) Contemporary painting of two embracing figures with surreal elements. 2) Post-impressionist style painting of trees with vibrant blues and greens. 3) Black and white illustration of a face with intricate patterns. 4) Japanese woodblock print style image of a figure in a checkered robe. 5) Photograph of a couple dancing, the woman in a black dress and the man in white

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Digital Archive Take It or Leave It: Institution, Image, Ideology
Art Jimmie Durham, Maria Thereza Alves, Collected Stones (Incident at Middelberg, A Stone from Metternich's House in Bohemia, 13 Rue Fenelon, Enough!, A Heavy Stone, HTV, Pink Granite at Work, Un Projet A Lille, Nature Morte, Towards Light, A Stone at Home in Bed Asleep, Stoning the Refrigera…
Collected Stones, by Jimmie Durham and Maria Thereza Alves, 2002

Jimmie Durham, Artist
Collected Stones (Incident at Middelberg, A Stone from Metternich's House in Bohemia, 13 Rue Fenelon, Enough!, A Heavy Stone, HTV, Pink Granite at Work, Un Projet A Lille, Nature Morte, Towards Light, A Stone at Home in Bed Asleep, Stoning the Refrigera… , 2002

Medium
Single-channel video, color, sound
Dimensions
21:39 min.
Credit Line
Courtesy of the artists and kurimanzutto, Mexico City. Video still courtesy of the artists and kurimanzutto

These short videos (shot by Maria Thereza Alves) show Jimmie Durham engaged in a wide variety of actions involving stones and rocks, a material the artist has returned to again and again. As a material used for making buildings, monuments, sculptures, and tools across cultures, stone is richly metaphoric, simultaneously generic and symbolic. Although there is a measure of violence in these vignettes, they are also sardonic and funny, so many games of rock-paper-scissors in which the rock always wins.