In the beginning, there was the word.
The beginning was 1959, and the word was happening. Drawing on the antics of Dadaism and surrealism, Manhattan Artist Allan Kaprow decided to stage a series of highly unorthodox, one-shot performances for a handful of friends in Greenwich Village. Read the invitation: "Think of a buying spree at Macy's; how to grow geraniums in New York. Do not look for paintings, sculpture, the dance or music."
There were paintings, sculpture, dance and music—of a sort. At the happenings that Kaprow and his colleagues staged, the "actors" splashed paint on canvas, played electronic John Cage...