Wednesday, November 2, 2011

Quiz on Jessica Frelinghuysen's lecture

On Wednesday Jessica Frelinghuysen presented a lecture on Performance Art.

Some of the works she featured:

William Wegman, video shorts (the deodorant, "massage" chair, etc)
Coco Fusco and Guillermo Gomez-Pena - piece at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History piece about a newly "discovered" people exhibited in cages
The Yesmen - corporate interventions
Marina Abramovic - performance piece where she stands nude with her partner in the doorway of a gallery forcing visitors to touch them while passing through
Improv Everywhere - Frozen Grand Central Station

Select an artist/artwork and describe how performance art is defined. How is it different from a work for the theater? How is it different from a sculpture or painting?

17 comments:

  1. In Improv Everywhere, "Frozen Grand Central Station" , as people were walking though grand central station, there was a large amount of people who were frozen in a certain position. The people who were frozen were frozen with their morning coffee in hand, their morning newspaper, or with their kids to name a few examples. All were partaking in normal daily activities that were not "posed" to be displayed as artwork necessarily. This piece was different from a normal piece of theater work because nothing was staged to be artwork but instead it almost just evolved into a piece. No tryouts were involved but instead anyone could participate. If you decided you wanted to freeze in time for a few minutes you could have to be part of the excitement and the art. This is also different from a sculpture or painting because no one was paying them to do anything it was a voluntary decision. I really appreciated this piece because it took a high traffic area that no one really appreciates as they walk through and turned it into an art display.

    Shelby Danow

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  2. The Yesmen create these 'corporate interventions' to draw attention to some seemingly ridiculous and wrong practices in the corporate world. They create these alias's and act as representatives of certain companies, and often use this to show what the companies should be doing. This work isn't only meant to give insight and have a shock factor, but to actually literally step into the corporate shoes. When they posed as a representative for Dow Chemical in aid to the tragedies in Bhopal that were caused by the company, there was a major global shock. This act not only drew people's attention to what had happened in the past, but cast the eye on Dow, and created that sense of guilt, and the question of why haven't they done this? This type of work is different from a sculpture or a painting because it is being taken out of the traditional forum of art, and takes on the message in a more literal way.

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  3. In Coco Fusco and Guillermo Gomez-Pena - piece at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History about a newly "discovered" people exhibited in cages, the performance relies on the reactions of the people viewing the piece. This performance piece involves two people posing as indigenous people put on display to be observed by visitors. Not many people react to the fact that they are humans being help captive in cages, or that they were taken away from they're people and home. This type of performance is different from a theatre performance because it was completely unscripted and reliant on the audience's feedback. There were no lines/script or anything along those lines, it was just caged people interacting and observing audience members and vise versa. It is different from a sculpture or painting because it is live, and it lasts for a certain amount of time. It cannot really be preserved any other way than video or photo and it is a performance!

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  4. In Improv Everywhere, a large number of people who were walking through central station suddenly stopped moving and froze as they were at a specified time. People froze walking, eating, one man even froze as he dropped a whole bunch of papers to the floor. This piece was different from a work for the theatre because it was not rehearsed, and it used everyday normal people rather than trained actors. It also had an element of surprise to it- the people who were not involved were not expecting anything like that to happen, whereas when you go to a theatre, you are expecting a show. It is different from a sculpture or painting in that it is a one-time thing. It can be re-preformed, but it will be different each time that it is done, whereas a painting or a statue is static, and no matter how many times you look at it, it will not change.

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  5. In Improv Everywhere, "Frozen Grand Central Station" , people started to stop and just freeze in whatever position they saw fit. The piece belongs to no one and revolves around time. At a certain time one person froze, interesting many others. The piece only exists during that time this is why it is so drastically different than a sculpture or painting. After an arbitrary amount of time, all the frozen people casually walk away back into their daily lives. This piece is very different from most theater work because of those prior reasons but also because of the improv and the fact that anyone at all could chime in and act frozen.

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  6. In William Wegman's video shorts, he uses an early video camera to record himself doing and saying strange things. The first of which is a still shot of him applying deodorant for about 30 seconds straight while rambling about it, the second is him sitting in an ordinary chair describing it as a self-powered massage chair operated by striking it with a stick. Wegman uses this bizarre brand of dry comedy and surreally dead-pan delivery to pique the interest of his audience, leaving them confused. his works are short and dull, and more like the alternative comedy of the 90s than the narratives in movie theaters. it is unlike a painting or sculpture in that it is distinctly human, and the amount of time one must take to observe it gives him more control over the impression it will leave.

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  7. Improv Everywhere's "Frozen Grand Central Station," offered much to the public that static art forms cannot as well as works done for theatre. In the piece people occupying the space in grand central station froze in whatever action they were doing such as eating, walking, talking etc. Differing from a work made for theatre, there were no actors, everyday people were used. Also, the people viewing it were not going to the place to view it, they had no idea it was going to happen, the performance came to them. There was also an opportunity for the audience to engage in the performance. Different from static pieces which can be looked at numerous times without changing, this piece is meant to occur and exist only in a specified amount of time.

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  8. Improv everywhere's "Frozen Grand Central Station" was a piece engaging the public in a communal piece of art. The leader organized a group of people to enter into GC and at a specific time they froze, any position of their choosing. By doing this they created a stop in time at the most busiest place in NYC, causing people to take a step back from their day and observe them. This piece in a way acted like a sculpture and was a piece of theater in real life for that period of time, especially since non participants were trying to be communicative to those who were participating.

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  9. With Marina Abramovic and her partner, they represent post-modern art with their thought provoking and unconventional performance piece. These two artists define their performance art by forcing the audience to interact with themselves, the piece. Performance art is all about drawing the audience in and engaging them, making them stop, observe your work, and think for a moment. The fact that it doesn't take place in a theater makes it more intimate and personal. It's more difficult to connect with a performer on a stage in contrast to having to walk between their naked bodies. That level of human interaction is what differentiates performance art with the more 'traditional' mediums of painting or sculpting. You can only view a sculpture or a painting. The interaction is limited. A performance, on the other hand, is more involved, and may leave a greater impression on the audience.

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  10. In "Frozen Grand Central Station" by Improv Everywhere, a large group of people freeze at the same time in the middle of busy train station. It was interesting to see all the different choices people made for their frozen moment. People were frozen walking, eating, drinking, looking at maps, etc. People who encountered frozen moment also had some interesting reactions. They stared, concerned, poked and showed interest. Likewise, performance art is presented live in a conventional way. It is different from a work for the theater because there is no script and it is only available for one time at the moment that is presenting. It is also different from from a sculpture or painting because it can not be bought or sold. Interaction with the public and incorporate public's reaction is only possible in performance art.

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  11. Improv everywhere had people all stop moving at the same time in grad central station. This is different from theater performance in that you didn't know you were going to see this performance take place, and the audience was a major roll in the what was taking place. They would walk through and around people sometimes even poking them to try to figure out what was going on. It is different from a sculpture or painting in that it only exists for that set amount of time. You may be able to watch a video of the event, but it physically taking place in that one moment is the actual piece.

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  12. In Improve Everywhere's piece they had several dozen people freeze at the exact same time in Grand Central Station and then continue moving as if nothing had happened at the same time. This is different from a performance in a theatre because the performers aren't necessarily professionals and the audience is composed of random people so they reach a wide variety of people. This piece is unlike a painting or sculpture because it is interactive with the audience able to walk among the performers, take pictures with them, video tape the experience, and even touch them. The piece is also very easy to replicate and only exists for a few minutes. It is the emphasis on stillness, the message behind the performance, that makes the piece performance art and not simply a theatre performance.

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  13. The Yes Men act out stunts that can't possibly take place in a theater. One of the most critical parts of their performance is that it must be in a context where it can be taken as 100% truthful. The beauty of the show is that they are mistaken for being real corporations and real people, while presenting views that are both silly, shocking, or blatantly different than the company indicates in reality. The most notable is their work with Dow Chemical and the faked Bhopal disaster apology. The act of revealing that they were in fact falsifying information and just playing the part of a company representative is what made the performance a source of impact. That Dow hadn't actually apologized is what caused social change, and they couldn't have been in a theater to cause the outrage in the first place.

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  14. The Improv Everywhere is a performance based piece in sense that the art is spontanenously made in a public space which forces others to interact with it. In the video of Improv Everywhere that we saw. There was a group of pople in a subway station that froze in time for a few minutes. This baffled people because the could not get the people to move. Some people were in the middle of an action like eating a banana, tying their shoe, etc. What I thought was amazing was how suddenly everyone started moving again and acted like they were not frozen. What makes this different from a painting is that the people around them are forced to come to their own conclusion of what is going on and why it is happening. Also, painting are something to be looked at, but this performance piece forced others to engage in the art piece whether they were frozen or not.

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  15. The improve Everywhere was interesting as they made a large group of people go in to the grand central station and suddenly freeze and stop what they were doing. It is set in a public space and it makes the audience interact with the frozen people. This piece is different from a work at a theater because the performers are just everyday people, not professionals as well. This piece is also different from a painting or a sculpture because this piece is suppose to be interactive with the audience (performance piece) and it is only happening at a limited amount of time.

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  16. In Improv Everywhere there is an interaction with the performers and the viewers that could not be achieved in a theater setting. Though the frozen movements and actions of those participating were interesting in themselves, it was the reaction of the spectators that actually brought the piece to life. The other people moving around the station were simply trying to go about their day, and their normal activities, but these performers got in their way. The man driving the cart that could not get through at first was especially entertaining because he didn't know what to do. The performers had to be very disciplined as well because they could not react to the non-performers, and they would have had no warning as what to expect. The element of surprise for the viewers was what really made the piece effective.

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  17. In one of Marina Abromovic's performance pieces, she and her partner stand naked in a door way, forcing anyone who wants to get through, to uncomfortably rub against their bodies as they pass through. The piece is very uncomfortable to watch because we think about how much we value our space. Getting close to a body like that is usually a very intimate and sensual experience. It makes the viewer uneasy in a way.

    This piece is different from a painting, sculpture or theatre piece in the sense that it is very interactive. It causes the viewer to interact in a strange way.

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