HOUSTON, TEXAS.- The Menil Collection presents Joseph Beuys: Actions, Vitrines, Environments, through January 2, 2005. The sculptural work of Joseph Beuys has wielded enormous influence among succeeding generations of artists in America and abroad, and Joseph Beuys: Actions, Vitrines, Environments will play a historic role in reasserting the artist�s importance for contemporary audiences. Although Beuys (1921-1986) has been accorded many major exhibitions throughout Europe, and a great deal of scholarship has been devoted to his work, there has been only one major Beuys sculpture exhibition in the English-speaking world (Guggenheim NY, 1979). This body of work, especially room-scale installations, is particularly relevant to younger artists who have dominated international exhibitions of the last decade.

The exhibition � curated by adjunct curator of Twentieth Century Art Mark Rosenthal and organized by The Menil Collection in collaboration with the Tate Modern, London � will examine Beuys�s work primarily in three areas: performance works, largely dating to the 1960s; vitrines of the 1970s; and environments, for most of the 1980s. (In each of these, Beuys worked with unusual materials to produce lyrical and dramatic compositions.) Assembling major works from Europe and the United States, the exhibition will enable English-speaking audiences to better understand the post-World War II European sensibility. Recognizing Beuys�s contribution to sculpture (especially as he relates to such historical figures as Alberto Giacometti and such post-Minimalists as Eva Hesse) the show will illuminate the contemporary phenomenon of installation art.

Joseph Beuys: Actions, Vitrines, Environments will be on view Feb. 4 � May 2, 2005 in London, where the exhibition is to be curated by Tate Modern senior curator Sean Rainbird.