Margin Release

15 responses so far ↓

• 1 Sara K // Apr 14, 2008 at 7:13 am

  Something I found interesting that I hadn’t thought about before is arts relationship to architecture. Architecture is functional and only possible if it is being paid for.
  Architecture represents the institution, it is the wall the art hangs on, the museum that the art is housed in. Whoever wrote the book were reading spoke of performance as a resistance to art as a commodified object but it is also resistance to the building itself as a symbol of the institution.

  “Historically performers had always been free from any dependence on establishment recognition and had, moreover, purposefully acted against the stagnation and academicism associated with the establishment.” Page181 But performance can also be commodified. Performed by the artist or even just instructions given by the artist to any layman can be commodified. I imagine the excitement and hype surrounding any performance, your presence there is special because it is a one time event and you bought tickets and showed up or you even just happened upon it on the street. Any which way it happens, it is precious that you saw something live.

  So in a simple way the trend of performance as resistance to object morphed into the object becoming the performance and the artist body becoming the commodified object. And then it turned into the artist-as-celebrity Andy Warhol kind of obsession which I think is sick. This writer seems sympathetic to this rock star movement because they were “coming of age with the media generation…raised on twenty-four-hour television and a cultural diet of B movies and ‘rock ‘n roll’,” I think the true art as life and life as art was totally butchered and “interpreted,” as the artist as genius/celebrity. Art about art is gross and I’m pretty sure its against anything I believe about art and life. Art about art is for corporate hallways and dining rooms in country mansions and white box’s.

• 2 matt // Apr 14, 2008 at 6:52 pm

  I agree with most of what Sara wrote.
  I could not help but feel uncomfortable as the reading discussed the growth of performance art that drew from popular culture. This was in an effort to rail against the establishment and reconnect with popular culture, which is to say, ordinary people. As far as I am concerned, that has failed in many ways.
  Just because performance art draws from popular culture does not mean it is accessible to users of popular culture. We all know how often contemporary art practice is denigrated by many people as being “out there,” to use the nicest terms I can think of. Simply put, art for “the people” might use “the people”’s imagery, but it doesn’t mean that people will like it or immediately get it. Appropriating mass culture in order to claim that your art is accessible just doesn’t work for me, especially when it’s done in an ego-driven way and the art is shown at institutions/festivals that aren’t a part of mass culture.
  This is in no way saying that I don’t like the art that was discussed; I enjoy almost all of it. However, I also realize that the swing towards conceptualism has been too extreme. In the conditions we are in now, it is almost impossible to understand a piece without an explanatory note. This is something I grieve about.

• 3 noah the carpathian // Apr 14, 2008 at 9:05 pm

  I had many of the same concerns that Matt had. As a music composition student, it goes without saying that I’ve spent a lot of time ruminating on the gaping and apparently insurmountable chasm between popular and “art” forms. Given that I am getting what is essentially a vocational degree in the craft of something that has been devalued to the point of nonexistence in the eye of the public, the search for a means by which we can make “art” music or “art” art appealing to laypeople is of paramount importance.

  As Matt pointed out, the vast majority of what we consider to be contemporary “art” art (that is, art that is aware of and informed by the larger history, canon, or tradition of art) is roundly dismissed as self-indulgent bullshit by virtually everyone who isn’t the creator of the art or a creator of comparably “contemporary” art. Even this is impressive in comparison the the state of contemporary art music as it exists in the popular consciousness. The question of interfacing with popular culture is obviously a conundrum of considerable gravity for anyone with creative output, particularly those who desire an audience comprised of someone other than themselves.

  While I would not claim to know what the solution to this problem is, or even that there is a solution (or, in the spirit of open-mindedness, that the extinction of “art” art/music/culture is a problem), I can say fairly certainly that defining art as the process of being shot in the arm, or lying down in a burlap sack in the middle of a street (I obviously picked an extreme example for the purposes of the argument) is almost always going to be dismissed as not only insane and ridiculous, but probably not art.

  For the most part, prior to the 20th century, there was no question about what was and was not art or music, because art came in a frame and music came in a tuxedo. Without attaching any value judgments, it can certainly be said objectively that one of the major shifts in art/music since the turn of the 20th century has been the constant self-examination and questioning of what art/music is and/or can be (John Cage’s 4′33” for an obnoxiously obvious example, or virtually anything in the packet we just read). I think in many regards, this equivocation over the boundaries of the definition of art or music is in many ways what has led to the public’s progressively emaciated interest, because it demands considerably more active involvement on the part of the audience. While I don’t know the correct approach to popular accessibility (or if popular accessibility is even desirable), I can only echo Matt’s sentiment – in attempting to create democratized and populist work in protest of an art establishment perceived as stodgy and elitist, these artists may have in fact effected further rarification.

• 4 Max Theodore Kotelchuck // Apr 14, 2008 at 9:38 pm

  In many ways, I too feel that conceptual art has many limitations for popular audiences. Matt is correct when he argues that drawing from popular culture isn’t enough to make a performance piece accessible to mass audiences. The performance art referenced in the reading reminds me of some of the net.art that both draws on references, allusions, to popular culture, but is totally inaccessible to most audiences. Web-art too, claims inherently to be anti-commercialism, anti-estblishment. But is esoteric artwork the consequence of rebellion against the establishment? I think there is a strong connection between what we, as artists, might see as ’selling out,’ and the development of inclusive, accessible work. It brings up a lot of questions for me about the responsibility of artistry. To what extent is artistic expression obligated to mass audience?

  In most respects i agree with sara’s point that, “Art about art is for corporate hallways and dining rooms in country mansions and white box’s,” but Im also excited by a lot of conceptual artwork that does reference art, or the history of art in some way. Is art for art’s sake different from any other discipline? Is biology for biology’s sake irrelevant? or useless? Does everything have to address some larger meaning?

• 5 ben // Apr 14, 2008 at 11:44 pm

  I found it ironic that, despite the intentions of performance art to fly in the face of consumer culture, many of the performance art pieces covered in this article could be seen to serve as test runs for highly successful mass media sensations. For example, Chris Burden, an artist from California, became notorious for a work entitled Shooting Piece, in which he asked a friend to shoot him in the left arm. In Jackass: The Movie, a video documentary of a series of increasingly idiotic and irresponsible acts, someone volunteers to be shot in the stomach with a non-lethal bullet. In Shooting Piece, Chris Burden loses a large chunk of flesh due to his friend’s poor marksmanship. In Jackass: The Movie, the bullet inflicts great physical pain, though arguably less long-term damage. Mr. Burden describes such “calculated risk” as “an energizing factor” in his artwork. However, calculated risk is very much a capitalist notion, and whether it describes the risk of bodily harm or monetary loss, it is fundamentally a tool for reaping profit, as illustrated by the success of Jackass and its sequels.

• 6 arden // Apr 15, 2008 at 7:00 am

  With regards to Sara and Matt’s comment, I have to say that I share similar sentiments concerning the evolution of performance art. While I do not consider myself a fan of the medium, I did find (from what we read) that many of its early conceptual explorations, specifically the mid 1960s-1970s, could be deemed as beneficial in the development of how an audience reassesses the definition of art. Nevertheless, performance art clearly includes the elements of acting and self-awareness, and I found that these components overwhelmed the work as it advanced. This appears to be especially true with its relation to the media and pop culture, and the artist’s notion that he/she should be, “rich – glamorous – and artists’ so they founded a magazine File” (p.179). This brought to mind the idea of whether art should be made to fulfill a consumer standard, to play into the expectations of commercialism rather than challenge it. In my opinion, I find that art loses its value when this occurs, because, as Ben pointed out, it can be recreated by anyone and considered our next popular reality, t.v. show. This also brings up the issue that Matt addressed about art being accessible to all. I have to agree with him in saying that when I was reading the article I felt that the pieces could be considered hugely inaccessible even though they were meant to connect the artist to the viewer. However, the more I think about it, a great deal of art is inaccessible, including work created here at Oberlin. For many outsiders, including the prospie I hosted this weekend, they have no idea what much of the art is about without an explanatory note. So in this way, I find that we are similarly guilty of our criticisms.

• 7 Hannah Noelle Celeste Vaughan // Apr 15, 2008 at 7:14 am

  I think there is much to be defended in this article. I really believe that the break from what Noah calls “frame art” was a radical and fantastic move in the history of Art. I really love the development and directions in performance art that this piece describes. It broke the boundaries of what art was supposed to be, and created a world in which art could really be the most creative gesture that anyone could think of. Conceptualization, the move toward more interdisciplinary art, all things that I think are for the most part, very good and necessary progressions of art. The conceptualization of art can go too far as max said, but I think it is also a fascinating approach to art that breaks the simple pretty-frame-art-for-consumption cycle making art about something more than just a landscape. Sure conceptual art can become so obscure it can no longer make any sense to anybody but the artist, but at least people are trying to figure out something, at least they are challenged by art. Another aspect of performance art that I think is an instrumental move toward New Media and contemporary art is the more interdisciplinary approach to art making. I think this is what I notice most about New Media today. I believe that leading art towards the possibility of interdisciplinary art is a real freedom that has benefited art greatly today. Just think about Paul Dimarinis, He does, electronics, new and very very old, fish, music and fire. If that is not interdisciplinary I don’t know what is. An example of interdisciplinary art that is really interesting to me was Franz Erard Walther the artist from Hamburg who used dancers to create a slowly moving sculpture. (the body as sculpture! How cool!) I think most of us college students are very interdisciplinary in our art learning, and making and I think we have a lot to thank this generation of performance artists for.

• 8 cubby // Apr 15, 2008 at 7:14 am

  sara’s suggestion of a progression in which performance art first resisted the museum as institution to avoid the commodification of art, but then evolved to the performance and the body of the artist becoming the commodified object, and finally heightened to the artist-as-celebrity interests me. That the museum or gallery reappeared so relatively quickly in this movement may be attributed to the inescapability of the marketplace, as we discussed on Thursday.
  The museum stands for much more than a house of merchandise, however. A museum has been designed and therefore imparts an experience to its visitor even before art enters the picture. Any designed space to contain art also presents its own experience. Sara’s ‘corporate hallways and dining rooms in country mansions and white boxes’ also fit this category. All of these spaces impose an architecturally designed way of looking at art. It makes sense to me that performance artists back then would not want to risk the experience offer by the delimited space and the experience offered by their performance art—the experience element was the essence of their art. That also there had never been anything but paintings hanging in museums makes cohabitation of these two experiences seem difficult. The progression mentioned before enforces that is an impossibility—the museum can only intake art as objects (like paintings) not art as experiences.
  But is it possible to see the museum as presenting a mediating experience?

  Is the performance itself a container or a mediator for the experience of the viewer, which is the true artistic goal? Does this a parallel between architecture for art and performance art itself that can be drawn from to create a new and very different style of gallery, respectful of art as an experience and not an object? (one that would necessarily not be concerned with trade) Could this work into our idea of New Mediation?

• 9 dory // Apr 15, 2008 at 7:41 am

  I’ve been thinking in a similar vein as everyone else when it comes to issues of commodification. Something that’s struck me in particular, though, is what Matt said– “Just because performance art draws from popular culture does not mean it is accessible to users of popular culture. ”
  Issues of accessibility are central, I think, to a lot of radical performance art in general. I’ve been doing reading about performers like Vaginal Cream Davis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaginal_Cream_Davis) and the relationship between them are their audiences. When does fringe performance art become alienating instead of revolutionary? Are the two mutually exclusive? Is being alienated by art necessarily a bad thing? In order to answer these questions, I think it’s important to think really seriously about audience. Art for art’s sake does have an audience, and I think that museums (although they’re frequently problematic) do have a place in the discourse.

• 10 john // Apr 15, 2008 at 5:13 pm

  1. It was interesting that Matt asked in class today whether we thought Dan Deacon was art. Julia then talked about the gray area between what is art and what is not art. But it seems like the artist has a lot of control over this gray area. When an artist declares something as Art, it becomes art, especially with the help of the artist’s status, critics’ approval, and museums’ attention. But even without all these supporting factors, when one artist declares anything as Art, it has an almost immediate validity. I feel it is more uncommon to hear a reaction that says “that is not art.” We may say that it is good or bad art, but rarely do we or can we say something is not art.
  On the other hand, the audience seems a lot more hesitant than the artist to declare things as art or not. Because Sir Deacon did not explicitly declare his work as an Art piece, Matt asked us whether we think it is art. But if Deacon already claimed his work as Art, would Matt still ask us about its status as Art? or would he jump straight to the question of whether it is good or bad art?

  2. When work is so highly abstract or conceptual, it is important for it to be visually appealing. Because if the idea of he artwork written on paper is and sounds more elegant and engaging than the actual material or performance, then there’s no justification for it to be made or performed. The artwork that is made should be essential to the concept and not just supplemental. If it is superfluous or incomprehensible, the art only becomes a distraction to the idea.

  3. The performance art like the one the artist did that laid out tools of pleasure and pain for people to use upon her to their content… or the one where he got shot in the arm… Is it really essential for it to have really happened? If the story or the set-up could simply be told or fabricated through film, then what makes it necessary for things that dangerous to be performed? This question is especially relevant for people who were never even there to experience the piece live in the first place. Where our only knowledge of it being real is from hearing other people saying that it was so.
  Secondly, what is the significance of such performances being real for the artist? Why should the artist really go about risking their lives or waking up at 4am to tell secrets in a shed? Why not just insist upon its truth and say you did it?
  It seems more pertinent to the first artist I mentioned, where she let any visitor do anything to her, until the one visitor pointed a loaded gun to her head and then they started fighting. In this case, the reality of the work was necessary because the potential strength of the work lied not just in her execution of it, but also the participatory outcome of her audience.
  On the other hand, shooting yourself in the arm doesn’t seem to merit the same necessity of reality. That the significance of his piece came from “I Really got shot, and it Really hurt,” seems to detract from his piece, since there are people that are really getting shot. His really doing it sounds like it reduces his work to spectacle, an attempt to wow us rather than have us contemplate the real issues of the representation of violence in media.
  or whatnot.

• 11 Lauren // Apr 15, 2008 at 7:14 pm

  What struck me most about this reading was the lengths that the artists went for the sake of their expression. Most notable was Rudolf Schwartzkogler who died at the hand of his work. Reading about the ritual performances of Gina Paine, who lay suspended above fifteen burning candles, and Marina Abramovic whose performance asked viewers to torture and pleasure her, ultimately ending in a fight over the loaded gun placed to her head. These artists put their bodies in harms way for the sake of their work, their work is about the universal feelings that every person with a body can feel, pleasure, pain, fear, anxiety. These performances were widely relatable since each viewer posseses a body and can relate to the feelings that the artist undergoes. It seems as though these artists approached their work not as a job, but as a lifestyle. It seems as though current artists are more concerned with fame and money than creating a universal life affirming experience. It would be nice to return to the conviction of these artists who put themselves out there, literally.

• 12 anna // Apr 15, 2008 at 10:53 pm

  Performance art opens up new realms of space and new dimensions that new media similarly enables. Performance opens new dimensions and the infinite possibility of expression that arises within this new dimension.
  Similarly, I find that what we loosely agree on to be New Media, has opened a new dimension, or at least investigated a new medium in the same way. In the 1970s artists were on the cusp of breaking into and exploring 3-D space in which the body and the surrounding become the medium. I think that there is an inherent tie between new media and performance art: new media is within the tradition of the foundations of performance art. And as we struggle to define what new media is, I think performance art lends itself to that definition.
  In the same way that performance art sought to recontextualize movement, bodies and spaces in order to awaken a public that was falling asleep to institutions and their affects on the body, new media serves in the same tradition: to keep the public awake during a constantly evolving culture of media and as it were, medium.

• 13 sarah // Apr 16, 2008 at 7:53 pm

  I do not think that the art discussed in the article is accessible to the masses. I do not think it is even accessible to other artist or the artist themselves. I really do not understand, or particularly want to for that matter ,why someone would want to cut a goat apart and pour it over another person, nor do I want to witness the trampling of hundreds of frogs in white shirts. I do not mean to say that everything must have an explanation and purpose but it would be nice that if something lacked that it was still be something you wanted to look at. And again I do not mean something has to be beautiful but it should be compelling/gripping which would translate into visually interesting.

  Like Arden I do not think I would have enjoyed witnessing much of the performances mentioned in the article. However, I do think that it was very important for “Art” that they did happen. The article emphasizes a very strict and repetitive cycle of singular work in a singular medium to group productions using many mediums. Each cycle also challenged specific rules and catering to a specific audience. Without the performance art/out-thereness of the 60’s to early 80’s I do not think artist now would be able to do what they are today. Not that people now are doing crazier things but I think it allowed for a broader definition and acceptance of art for the future.

• 14 logan // Apr 30, 2008 at 7:08 pm

  I think it’s important for the discussion about commodification of art to acknowledge that it is the nature of ideas to spread out and mutate and evolve with one another like germs. This is only so much more pronounced in a media environment which allows for an overwhelming number of messages to constantly be passed back and forth and imitated and changed. This along with an always changing context by which works can be judged makes it difficult to talk about the definitive “merits” or “legitimacy” of performance art or any other art for that matter. ( Take for instance the Stuckists, a group of artists formed in Britain in 1999 which denounced conceptual art in favor of actual painting–and in turn was denounced as illegitimate by the art world. Come four or five years later the group was having their work shown in galleries along with other conceptual artists and was itself considered an act of conceptual art. Link:
  http://www.stuckism.com/).

  We need to realize as artists that the commodification and co-opting of ideas/ideals is only an inevitability. If anything I think the success of popular performance art of the 80’s, and even more current things like Jackass, speak to the validity of the early performance art. Isn’t that the definition of an avant-garde afterall?

• 15 Gavin // May 14, 2008 at 11:10 pm

  I agree with Logan’s comment regarding the nature of ideas to “spread and mutate” (in new media and perhaps even performance art), that the commodification and co-opting of avant-garde or outsider art is inevitable. Additionally, rather than err on the side of essentialism , expressing what is not art or dismissing “art about art”, I think it is essential to approach/consume/critique it dialectically. Much of this idea of “art for art’s sake” seems rooted in modernist/post-war modernist nostalgia, positing a “true” or “legitimate” art that and reifies creativity/life/whatever. Rather than fall into the same traps that people fell into/still fall into today, why not take a critical approach of art, as a discipline/ practice,/institution,/soci-cultural construct/life through art? Otherwise, much of this just turns into a debate about value… which ehh, I don’t have the energy for.

  In many regards I think the performance artists engaged in this criticism (again, it is okay for criticism to be masturbatory sometimes) much as new media artists do today. The relation that the artist has with art history is relatively undeniable (though some may emphasize contemporary reference, engaging in this practice more or less necessitates a dialogue with this history in some form), but even more so than the performance artists of the 70’s and 80’s new media artists seem to be past this “art of appropriation” in that, our references are hardly traceable to some origin, and our culture engages a hyper-appropriation, even greater activity of forms, signs, whatever. In making art about art, hopefully it sometimes isn’t just about being a celebrity or getting paid, much of the new artists today don’t simply appropriate more forms for the sake of it, they enable a consideration of art, turning it on its head, looking at where it comes from, the history of art as an institution/discipline/practice/socio-cultural construct/whatever.

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