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Mark Lombardi’s Narrative Structures and Other Mappings of Power Relations

August 22, 2012 by Fosco Lucarelli 12 Comments

(…) the great question today is the question of globalization, the question of the unity of the world. Globalization proposes to us an abstract universality. A universality of money, the universality of communication and the universality of power. That is the universalism today. And so, against the abstract universality of money and of power, what is the question of art, what is the function of artistic creation?
Excerpt from Alain Badiou’s “Fifteen Theses on Contemporary Art“

Mark Lombardi was considered an American Neo-Conceptualist and an abstract artist.
His major legacy was linked to his large-scale linear diagrams attempting to trace the structures of financial and political power, corruption and affairs among capitalists, politicians, corporations, and governments (or, said à la Marx: that “Band of hostile brothers“).

All images and Mark Lombardi’s texts Courtesy of Donald Lombardi and Pierogi Gallery.

His self-titled “Narrative Structures” are structurally similar to sociograms (diagrams used in the field of social network analysis) and each node or connection of the diagrams is drawn from news stories from reputable media organizations. Lombardi was also influenced by the work of Hans Haacke, Herbert Marcuse and information graphic designer Edward Tufte.

A nodal point in Mark Lombardi’s oeuvre was the 1999 “George W. Bush, Harken Energy and Jackson Stephens, ca 1979–90” (also shown in dOCUMENTA 13), which described the alleged connections between James Bath, the Bush and bin Laden families, and business deals in Texas and around the world.

Click to view full size:

A strong influence by Mark Lombardi’s work can be seen in Futurefarmers Josh On’s 2004 “They Rule“, that also drew a lot from “The Power Elite“, a book written in 1956 by the sociologist C.Wright Mills.

Click for full size:

“In 1994 I began a series of drawings I refer to as “narrative structures.” Most were executed in graphite or pen and ink on paper. Some are quite large, measuring up to 5 x 12 feet. I call them “narrative structures” because each consists of a network of lines and notations which are meant to convey a story, typically about a recent event of interest to me, like the collapse of a large international bank, trading company, or investment house. One of my goals is to explore the interaction of political, social and economic forces in contemporary affairs. Thus far I have exhibited drawings on BCCI, Lincoln Savings, World Finance of Miami, the Vatican Bank, Silverado Savings, Castle Bank and Trust of the Bahamas, Nugan Hand Limited of Sydney, Australia, and many more. Working from syndicated news items and other published accounts, I begin each drawing by compiling large amounts of information about a specific bank, financial group or set of individuals. After a careful review of the literature I then condense the essential points into an assortment of notations and other brief statements of fact, out of which an image begins to emerge. My purpose throughout is to interpret the material by juxtaposing and assembling the notations into a unified, coherent whole. In some cases I use a set of stacked, parallel lines to establish a time frame. Hierarchical relationships, the flow of money and other key details are then indicated by a system of radiating arrows, broken lines and so forth. Some of the drawings consist of two different layers of information—one denoted in black, the other, red. Black represents the essential elements of the story while the major lawsuits, criminal indictments or other legal actions taken against the parties are shown in red. Every statement of fact and connection depicted in the work is true and based on information culled entirely from the public record.
– Mark Lombardi (Artist Statement)”

Read more:
Ben Fry’s article on Mark Lombardi
About “George W. Bush, Harken Energy and Jackson Stephens c. 1979-90”: “Obsessive—Generous” – Toward a Diagram of Mark Lombardi by Frances Richard
Alain Badiou’s “Fifteen Theses on Contemporary Art”
“Politics. ich-ichs-wir“, an exhibition featuring Lombardi at Columbus Art Foundation
“Nineteeneightyfour“, an exhibition at the Austrian Cultural forum, NYC.
“Utterance Is Place Enough: Mapping Conversation“, by Frances Richard (on Cabinet Issue 2 – Mapping Conversations Spring 2001)
Social Networks Sept 13, 2004, by Francis Lam

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Comments

  1. Robert Tolksdorf says

    May 13, 2015 at 3:46 pm

    At http://www.lombardinetworks.net/ I have digitized some works of Lombardi as datastructures in standardized formats and demonstrate a bit what can be done digitally with them.

Trackbacks

  1. Hi yes I think meeting on friday before… « Bigger Picture 2012-13 Group 10 SUBGROUP 4 says:
    November 22, 2012 at 12:26 am

    […] -analysis of the structure of the chosen corporation in a pictorial way (i.e. http://socks-studio.com/2012/08/22/mark-lombardi/ or […]

  2. Week 7 – Gaps/ layers/ Doors: Archive Fevers | Performing the Archive Coursework Blog says:
    April 3, 2013 at 4:24 pm

    […] power, corruption and affairs among capitalists, politicians, corporations, and governments.” http://socks-studio.com/2012/08/22/mark-lombardi/ it has been said that due to the way Lombardi chooses to display his findings that when you look at […]

  3. MIND MAPS Exposición Galería Paula Alonso. Festival a3bandas | CulturaSuicida says:
    April 17, 2015 at 11:56 am

    […] artista conceptual Mark Lombardi prefirió centrarse en documentar, bajo su personal mirada, los posibles fraudes y relaciones […]

  4. Marc Lombardi | Design Thinking 2015 - Tessa's group says:
    April 26, 2015 at 11:36 am

    […] relations of power and capital in his drawings. You can see a good number of them here, and also listen to this short piece from NPR about why, a few weeks after the September 11 […]

  5. Le plan comme disposition | Spatioblog says:
    May 15, 2015 at 12:46 pm

    […] – Une disposition des connaissances par Mots-clés et relations […]

  6. Mark Lombardi Narrative Structures | Draw No Conclusions says:
    May 18, 2015 at 8:41 pm

    […] http://socks-studio.com/2012/08/22/mark-lombardi/ […]

  7. Mark Lombardi’s Narrative Structures | Yurika Mulase @ ITP says:
    September 23, 2015 at 8:41 pm

    […] Source […]

  8. The Artist Who Obsessed the FBI – Perfect Hour says:
    June 17, 2016 at 2:07 am

    […] By coincidence, only days before, Intelligence Newsletter, a tiny publication with a sharp focus on the intelligence community, had reported that George W. Bushs presidential campaign could run into trouble over the candidates association with Khalid bin Mahfouz, banker to the Saudi royal family. Bin Mahfouz, a Saudi national, was under investigation by American authorities for surreptitiously funding a terrorist organization called al Qaeda through his charitable foundations. He had also had extensive though indirect dealings with Bush during his oil days through Texas middleman James Bath, a subject Lombardi treated extensively in his drawing series on Bushs oil company, Harken Energy. […]

  9. Data Visualisation – SOMA2480 says:
    October 28, 2016 at 10:06 am

    […] Plate 2: Lombini, Mark, 1999. Mark Lombini, George W Bush, Harken Energy and Jackson Stephens, c 1979-90 (5th Version), 1999, coloured pencil and graphite on pencil, 153.7 x 190.5cm. Image. Accessed 28 October 2016 http://socks-studio.com/2012/08/22/mark-lombardi/ […]

  10. Mark Lombardi’s Narrative Structures and Other Mappings of Power Relations - The Network Visualization Catalog says:
    December 2, 2016 at 5:29 pm

    […] ➤ Source […]

  11. Assignment 2: Tutor feedback reflection – ANDREA's OCA BLOG: Understanding Painting Media says:
    September 5, 2017 at 11:44 am

    […] Lucarelli, F. (2012) Mark Lombardi’s Narrative Structures and Other Mappings of Power Relations [blog] [online]. Socks, Paris, 22 August. Available from: http://socks-studio.com/2012/08/22/mark-lombardi/ […]

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