Benjamin Patterson

Benjamin Patterson (born 1934 in Pittsburgh, PA, USA–2016 in Wiesbaden, Germany) studied music and became a double bass player in the Halifax Symphony Orchestra in Canada in 1957 after being denied a position in the USA due to racial discrimination. During his military service in Germany, he came into contact with the experimental music scene in Cologne, and from there moved on to Paris. Patterson was a co-founder of Fluxus and co-organizer of the Fluxus International Festival of Newest Music in Wiesbaden in 1962. He developed an open, ambiguous conception of art early on, delegating interpretation and responsibility to the audience. Missing the political dimension of Fluxus he felt alienated as the only Black person in a predominantly white art scene. With the civil rights movement gaining strength, he returned to the U.S. and settled with his family in New York, where he worked as a librarian and cultural manager, interrupting his artistic career in favor of gainful employment. In 1988, he returned to art and concentrated on object-based performative works performing worldwide. In 2010 he received his first retrospective at CAMH Houston and Studio Museum Harlem, which was expanded at the Kunstverein Wiesbaden 2012. Numerous international exhibitions followed, and an invitation to Documenta 14 rounded off his artistic career.