Description
Jim Crawford is a name that some may have never heard of, and others know well. Even as a young graduate of Wayne State University’s master of fine arts program in 1969, Crawford was a respected figure of the Cass Corridor movement. Detroit Institute of Arts influential contemporary curator, Sam Wagstaff, introduced Crawford and other artists to Detroit’s collectors. With this entrée and his own initiative, Crawford exhibited work in Detroit and in New York.
Crawford’s intellectualism and fascination with the industrial landscape align him with artists from the pivotal Cass Corridor era. His early experimentation with such unconventional materials as neon and dry ice, as well as his radical public performances and ephemeral site-specific installations also connect him to early Minimalism and related movements, such as Process Art, that emerged from the avant-garde New York and Los Angeles scenes.
