i dream we go around kellerberrin doorknocking to see if there are any eligible bachelors in the town.
Archive for April, 2005
On the weekend i went down to perth to participate in a workshop by uk artists 'lone twin'. anne had tipped me off on it, and i managed to get there at the last minute. this performance duo is pretty inspiring. they take 'pointless activity' to the max - for example line dancing, blindfolded, without music, in cowboy costumes, for 12 hours continuously. in another work, they were asked to link two art centres at opposite ends of an english village, colchester. they got a map and drew a straight line with a ruler between the 2 centres. then they decided to walk as close to a straight line as possible between the two places. To make it a bit more difficult, they wore their cowboy outfits and dragged with them a telegraph pole - it took 8 days! each person they met with told them stories about the town… one woman said they had arrived "25 years late" since that was when a wall blocking their way had been built. each of these encounters was documented by burning the initials of the person into the pole using a magnifying glass and the sun. when they finally arrived at their destination, a crowd of townsfolk had gathered. they all raised the pole together, and lone twin told their stories back to them.
The title of the workshop was “performance and kindness”. [see http://www.cityofswan.com/nrla/workshops.htm] Lone twin are interested in the idea that their activity often generates kindness from those they come into contact with. In return, their lavishing of time and attention on a place or activity is a sort of kindness in itself. It's an interesting concept in relation to performance art, given its famous history of (self) violence. But then i started thinking about the idea of kindness. The word began to me to have a ring of other sorts of “ness” - you know, like the “tree-ness” of a tree is that it should stand tall and provide shade. The “bird-ness” of a bird is that it should fly and have feathers. Of course, these ness-es are negotiable, and changeable over time… It occurred to me that the word “kind” (when used interchangeably with the word “sort” could be a kind of category word – a word which attempts to come to grips with the thing-ness of a thing.
One definition of "kind" from dictionary.com: "Fundamental, underlying character as a determinant of the class to which a thing belongs; nature or essence."
Thus:
"Kind-ness": the condition of a thing that it should *be like* something (that it should "have a kind"). The character of a thing, precisely that it should *have* a character of some sort.
It's a humble definition, i realise, (and a fuzzy unformed one) but not without some kindness (generosity) within itself – it respects the nature of something for what it is, without trying to change it.
[the following post is part of the Bilateral Kellerberrin project. For more on my Cunderdin workshops, see this link.]
cunderdin is 45 km from kellerberrin. As part of my residency at kellerberrin i am running some school workshops. Since i often do these kind of workshops (as a job) i thought it would be interesting to approach them as an experiment “in themselves” ie – something without a known outcome. That way the workshop process becomes as much a part of my ongoing project as any other aspect of the residency.
Felena found what could be the ideal class for such an experiment – the multimedia and information-communication technology (MM ICT) class at cunderdin high. The students are about 13-14 years old, there are about ten of them. Their teachers, Iain and Trevor, have a focus on film/video and computers, respectively. I think its an interesting class to be working with (as opposed to an “art” class) because there is already, i reckon, an openness to the idea of utilising whatever materials and processes happen to be in front of you, and are appropriate, for a given project.
Of course, the kind of art that i do was kinda unfamiliar to them. I ran them through a very rough powerpoint presentation of some of my projects, trying to draw the focus onto a careful consideration of the banal and everyday as an approach to art making. The “Cornflakes” performance and the orange juice installation were kind of confusing to them, I think. But I pressed on. The lecture theatre piece with cushions may have made an impact, I'm not sure. It's hard to tell when you are not only introducing them to your work, but also the the WHOLE IDEA of this kind of work. One bright spark kept asking “what's the point?” (something that Deakin students also asked a few weeks ago when i talked to them) and indeed that is perhaps the crucial question.
Trevor pointed out afterwards that it was potentially empowering for them to realise that they can make something out of what is in front of them – it is an honouring of the minor things that make up your life. I guess that's some kind of point. But anyway, a lack of point didnt seem to deter them from sitting with me, fairly undistracted, for an hour, which is an achievement with any kids of that age, i reckon, especially when i am not trying to seduce them with razzamatazz.
Before they ran off to little lunch I tried to squeeze out of them some of their interests, with a view to “doing something” together for the 4 weeks when they get back from their fortnight of holidays.
“What would you like to do with that period of time?”
Responses included :
-make something…a car? Drive it off a cliff – a destruction piece. (are there any cliffs around here?)
-make our own drugs (probably a bit out of our league in the time frame)
-create our own music, create our own games.
-design a hockey stick (i was impressed with this one, this project would involve carpentry, graphic design, engineering drawings, testing etc)
-make a cartoon character.
-a car racing or horse racing game
-something involving guitars.
It was good to gauge what they were into, and the idea of games and music popped up a bit, so maybe we can head off in that direction. I am aware that I need to structure, quite cleverly, the “freedom” which i intend to give them. It is probably most unproductive to let them loose and do “whatever they want” because (like improvised performance) they will most likely fall back on that which is familiar, behaviour wise, and i want to do the opposite. Probably I will begin each week with exposure to some particular items of art or media (either by me or by various luminaries i rustle up) and then get them to participate in a collaboration/play activity a la allan kaprow, something self-contained, so there is a “result” within the day. If these are adequately documented, it would be enough of an achievement to present the findings of four activities as a “workshop outcome”.
[the following is part of the Bilateral Kellerberrin project].
folks i have met so far in kellerberrin. a lotta them are men.
tony, a bearded guy on a bike who scared christina when she exited the gallery. he was very friendly, said he works wherever he can find it, at the moment helping a mate of his who is establishing a vineyard west of keller somewhere. said his mate is waiting for a $400 000 loan to set it up. they have been setting up “faggots” - bundles of sticks to hold the grape seedlings in place. tony said there used to be a vineyard in keller at the nunnery…
mick, who is the community development officer at the shire council. actually, i met him when i was here in january, as he featured in some paintings of himself as napoleon (i could be wrong) which were hung in husein’s monumental painting extravaganza. his wife (pat?) is a distribution point for eggs, so i gave him our empty egg cartons. he had popped around to say goodbye to kirsten, but had missed her by about ten minutes.
Continue reading ‘kellerberrin folks’
Arrived in Kellerberrin late last week to begin a 2 month (April/May) residency with IASKA (International Art Space Kellerberrin Australia)… luckily I caught the launch of Kirsten Bradley (of Cicada)'s wonderful Saltmilk environment. Not sure what will pan out for me here in Keller, but a few things are shaping up in my mind:
-working with the quirky local newsletter "The Pipeline" (a photocopied A4 "zine" in which the contributors do their own design, it makes for a fabulous fluxus-like publication)…
-workshops with media students (13-14 year olds) in neighboring town Cunderdin to make some sort of collaborative project over the next month and a bit…
-new local blogging action including making my own rather than relying on blog-city…
-learning how to play chess (perhaps i will advertise in "The Pipeline" for a chess pardner…
-a big Expanded Cinema show at the end of the residency, including a mini-Aussie tour for the stunning Line Describing a Cone by Anthony McCall - (pictures here) - Perth Sydney and possibly Brisbane and Canberra…
-visits from all my wonderful Perth friends and family
-anything else you might care to suggest…
bianca hester is working on a collaborative project with undergrad students at VCA (victorian college of arts). you can see some of the progress of her erstwile students in a bloggy form here: http://studioeverybody.blog-city.com
much like the legendary allan kaprow, hester is keen to shake up her students a bit, to get them out of the normal routine of university art school process - which usually involves a single student authoring a single discrete and highly tangible object/outcome (and being "assessed" individually, and by an authority rather than peers).
instead, hester is "forcing" them to embark on a collaborative process, and to struggle with the project as a process in itself. i cant say i have any idea what the outcome might be, but the budding artists seem to have engaged in some sort of game based around "exchange" - they have divided their foci into "four intensities "falling under the headings "object, process, tool, material" - the use of which is kinda unclear…(one student's intensities were "TROLLY JOINING STRING SCISSORS")…
the blog comes across, to me, more as the collective minutes after an intense meeting, and i think thats why its a bit hard to follow what's going on. but it is clear that it is a site for exchange by the participants more than by interested outsiders like myself. furthermore (and this is most interesting to me) it is an experiment challenging the limits of hester's own practice as an artist. i'm itching to see and hear more…
[for related discussion, see this thread].
sigh. i gotta be overseas:…..
Marina Abramovic (re)performs works by Vito Acconci, Bruce Nauman, FF
Alumns, at the Guggenheim Museum, NY, April 8, 9.
Symposium
This two-day symposium is a prelude to the performance and exhibition
project Marina Abramovic: Seven Easy Pieces, scheduled for fall 2005, in
which the artist (re)performs and reinterprets seminal works from the 1970s
by Vito Acconci, Joseph Beuys, Valie Export, Bruce Nauman, Gina Pane, and
herself.
(Re)presenting Performance
FRI APR 8, 48 PM and SAT APR 9, 10 AM6 PM
A series of panels comprised of art historians, artists, choreographers,
filmmakers, and curators investigates the various histories of performance,
the plausibility of its repetition, and the urgency of its preservation.
Performance artists active during the 1970s are interviewed individually
about these issues, and younger artists discuss the impact of their legacy.
For more information, call the Box Office at (212) 423-3587.
Information at: (scroll to bottom of page)http://www.guggenheim.org/education/tours_lectures.shtml
======
reviews of the forum (the re-enactments themselves will occur in October 2005):
Marina Abramovic Plays With Herself: Re-Performing Others, Engaging the Audience, by
Theresa Smalec:
"Her decision to repeat specific pieces that influenced her work by redoing their original scores provoked symposium panelists to ponder: "What does it mean to re-enact a performance that was only supposed to happen once?" This seemed like an abstract speculation until the Guggenheim's curator addressed Abramovic with a flustered expression and whispered, "Why re-perform Vito Acconci's Seedbed as a woman?" Nervous laughter emanated from the audience. Abramovic calmly replied, saying it was partly the "taboo element" that intrigued her, and partly the "sculptural element." Too young to have witnessed Acconci's 1972 performance, I desperately tried to visualize the nature of the piece that people were chuckling about. Seedbed sounded seedy, but in an exhilarating way. What specific actions were required to re-embody it?"
<http://www.nyartsmagazine.com/pages/nyam_document.php?nid=749&did=2305>
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(Re)Performance at the Guggenheim, by Rodrigo Tisi:
"In the early days of performance art there was resistance to the idea of documentation, since the presence of a camera would rub up against the sacred fleeting moment of the event. But just as that pious attitude has faded, so too might the resistance to the idea of re-performance, and the merger of performance art with theater. There is a kind of brutal unsentimentality in the prospect of re-performance: performance art must admit that it is already a codified genre, without the marginal charm it once had. It's not a young discipline any more; it has to decide how it wants to grow up."
<http://www.nyartsmagazine.com/pages/nyam_document.php?nid=749&did=2312>
======
Reperforming the Score, by T. Nikki Cesare:
"The danger in this experiment lies in the subtle divide that occurs between composers and performers in Western classical music. That is, even though a woman's performance of Corporel might offer an entirely different reading of the piece, and even though the "open works" by such canonized composers as Cage, Boulez, Ligeti, and Stockhausen grant the performer more agency, allowing performance art to be defined by its originator rather than the body in the immediate moment of performance might not only compromise the sociopolitical context in which it is (re)performed, but also the autobiographical and intensely personal relationship between piece and performer, and performer and spectator. Perhaps the way to negotiate this divide is to re-evaluate both genres, establishing that the ephemerality that enables performance art to retain its political and personal impact also informs musical and theatrical, and visual art performance. The score, then, like the body, becomes the map by which the audience finds, or loses, their way. Either possibility opens up a Pandora's Box of opportunity."
<http://www.nyartsmagazine.com/pages/nyam_document.php?nid=749&did=2311>
MOVING
A HAPPENING BY ALAN KAPROW
(FOR MILAN KNIZAK)
SOME UNUSED HOUSES IN DIFFERENT PARTS OF THE CITY. ON EACH OF 4 DAYS, OLD FURNITURE IS OBTAINED AND IS PUSHED THROUGH THE STREETS TO THE HOUSES. THE FURNITURE IS INSTALLED.
ON THE FIRST DAY, BEDROOMS ARE FURNISHED, AND SLEPT IN THAT NIGHT.
ON THE SECOND DAY, DINING ROOMS ARE FURNISHED, AND A MEAL IS EATEN.
ON THE THIRD DAY, LIVING ROOMS ARE FURNISHED, AND GUESTS ARE INVITED TO COCKTAILS.
ON THE FOURTH DAY, ATTICS ARE FILLED AND THEIR DOORS ARE LOCKED.
THOSE INTERESTED IN PARTICIPATING SHOULD MEET AT 8PM NOV 27 1967 AT THE MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART, CHICAGO.
-from poster displayed in Warhol's Time Capsule show at the NGV.