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Kevin Ayers

Moyra Davey American, born Canada
2013
Not on view
Kevin Ayers is an elegiac look at record collectors through what the artist calls an "array of fascinating hand gestures: fingers flipping at a frantic pace through stacks of dusty, cat-clawed albums, or most beautiful of all, the pivot of the vinyl disk held in suspension between palm and fingertips to catch the light and reveal fatal flaws." Originally part of a commission from Tate Liverpool, the work was finished by Davey mailing each print to the Museum’s curators. En route to Liverpool, Davey came across an obituary for the English musician Kevin Ayers (a founding member of the psychedelic band Soft Machine in the mid-1960s), in which he was quoted: "I think the clever people are the ones who do as little as possible"—an anti-careerist sentiment that applies equally to the maker of this work.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Kevin Ayers
  • Artist: Moyra Davey (American, born Toronto, 1958)
  • Date: 2013
  • Medium: Chromogenic prints
  • Dimensions: Image: 12 × 17 1/2 in. (30.5 × 44.5 cm)
    Sheet: 12 × 17 1/2 in. (30.5 × 44.5 cm)
  • Classifications: Photographs, Collages
  • Credit Line: Purchase, Vital Projects Fund Inc. Gift, through Joyce and Robert Menschel, 2014
  • Object Number: 2014.276a–z
  • Rights and Reproduction: © Moyra Davey
  • Curatorial Department: Photographs

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