Sunday 18 January 2015

Andy Horwitz sez...


I am proposing that visual art performance, generally, is predicated on the objectification and abstraction of the human body, whereas contemporary performance – Time-Based Art with its origins in dance and theater – is more frequently predicated on the creation of a subjective field of experience – what I will call “experience design”. The aesthetic challenges of integrating light, sound, visual representation and embodied presence – sometimes even text – into a Gesamtkunstwerk are undertaken not to create a “living object” but to create a shared experience.

Okay: there's plenty more where this came from, but even I have limits. Andy Horwitz is discussing the problems of curating visual and performance art. In this paragraph, he gets to the point. There is a difference between performance that is created from a visual art tradition (I'd say that refers to Abramovich et al) and a theatre tradition. I am going to try to find out whether this division helps me.

Step one: visual art performance, generally, is predicated on the objectification and abstraction of the human body

Anyone want to help? 

Step two: Time-Based Art is more frequently predicated on the creation of a subjective field of experience – what I will call “experience design”

Again, any suggestions?

Let me take this very slowly. I think that Horwitz makes a distinction between the intentions of the two traditions. Frankly, I distrust any generalisation this large, but let's try a thought experiment.

Artist A - Mr Paint - and artist B - Mr Dramaturg - get commissions to present a performance for the latest exhibition at Gallery C (Big Corporate White Space). Mr Paint has recently done a series of sculptures and exhibited them at Gallery D (Underground Collective Venue), while Mr Dramaturg spent six months as the director of Play E (New Work by Postgraduate).

Mr Paint stands for our man in the visual art tradition. Mr Dramaturg has the theatre angle covered. 

Big Corporate White Space doesn't really give a shit what they get from the boys. It just wants some cool action when the usual suspects turn up for free wine.

Mr Paint decides on a burlesque routine. He dresses up as a monkey, and takes his clothes off to a recording of Artist F (Obscure Techno DJ).

Mr Dramaturg decides on a burlesque routine. He dresses up as a monkey, and takes his clothes off to a recording of Artist F (Obscure Techno DJ).

Mr Paint's version is intended to represent the body, and evoke a sense of how it is both erotic and animalistic, funny and serious, an object to be observed.

Mr Dramaturg's version is intended to highlight the emotional connection between the performer and his audience, to ask them to question how they feel.

Does this work?


3 comments :

  1. So what you're saying is that a piece of art (visual, performance or otherwise) can be viewed completely differently depending on the intentions of the artist? What about the intentions of the viewer? Does this have an impact on the presentation or reception of a piece of work? Can the intended outcome of how a piece of work change over time, despite the original artist having a particular intention?
    xx

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thank you for taking the time to comment, Dani. I am not saying it, honest: this was more an attempt to understand what Horwitz was saying. I might be wrong in my interpretation of him, but I don't subscribe to this position (yet). I am much more interested in the collaboration between artist and audience in the making of meaning...

    ReplyDelete
  3. Aah, I see: to be honest it's taken me quite some time to work out the original quote!
    I hope you don't mind: I've just written a blog myself inspired by your comment. I'm studying for a degree in Professional Practice and I've been struggling to find an inquiry research project that can encompass both my previous experience (as a performer), yet inform my intended future career hopefully in Dramaturgy or Creative Practice. This blog and your comment have sparked something off and sent my brain into overdrive!
    http://danitougher.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/task-4b-part-four.html
    So thank you!!
    xx

    ReplyDelete