In order to honor the participants and the process of OPEN, and to give the reader an idea of the scope of contributions that were generated over the four-day writing of this book it is necessary to include every bit of it, the unfinished thoughts, the queries, the tangents.
Framing the Message, Framing the Masterpiece
Art exists in context. Words have meaning in the context of culture. We can work towards a shared understanding. Participatory practice must be written into our memories through some kind of afterthoughts. Clement Greenberg made Andy Warhol's career by writing about it. How we talk about art is crucial to how we value it. Daring things can be disarmed. A Che Guevarra T-shirt, anyone? Tame things can be elevated to perilous levels.
A SIMILAR EVENT, FRAMED AS ART:
http://web.me.com/br0gan/ker/Art&Design/Entries/2009/1/21_Day_of_longboarding.html
http://www.diaart.org/exhibitions/main/22
http://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/huyghe/clip2.html
-At what point does the artist have an obligation to "truth" when engaging the public in his/her work?
Never? Why would engagement with the public obligate "truth"?
I guess this was leading into the next question.... I'm thinking about the difference between relational aesthetics and social practice, one uses community as a framework and the other engages a community directly? or ????
There's a level of fiction in this Huyghe piece that makes me uncomfortable... did the people involved know they were acting out a drama? Or does it matter? I can't find any information online about the actual community, outside of this piece, and there seems to be no record of them continuing the holiday as he planned. Everyone enjoys a parade, cake, and music, but
No. Bourriaud seems to argue that pretty much all art is inherently relational; it's just a matter of whether we want to be aware of that aspect of the work. --Me
OWNING IT: COME TOGETHER OVER ME
Here come old flattop he come grooving up slowly
He got joo-joo eyeball he one holy roller
He got hair down to his knee
Got to be a joker he just do what he please
He wear no shoeshine he got toe-jam football
He got monkey finger he shoot coca-cola
He say "I know you, you know me"
One thing I can tell you is you got to be free
Come together right now over me
He bag production he got walrus gumboot
He got Ono sideboard he one spinal cracker
He got feet down below his knee
Hold you in his armchair you can feel his disease
Come together right now over me
He roller-coaster he got early warning
He got muddy water he one mojo filter
He say "One and one and one is three"
Got to be good-looking 'cause he's so hard to see
Come together right now over me
John Lennon wrote the song “Come Together” (originally called "Come Together, Join the Party") as a campaign song for Timothy Leary's failed 1969 run for governor of California against Ronald Reagan.
Whatever John Lennon meant by "he bag production," and a close reading in the context of the song's circumstances is more work than I want to do on this text (and is tangential), I'll propose that the thrust of the song can be taken as a metaphor for the artist inviting the non-artist, the pop audience, the everyman to engage in cultural production as they come together "over me" or around the proposal by the charismatic personality, the Pied Piper of the artist as drum major, as ring leader, as instigator, as inviter, as prodder, suggester, convener.
Read this way, it suggests (disingenously) that artist and participant/everyman ("I know you, you know me") are in some ways equivalent. Artists' protests to the contrary--protests that suggest that the artist intends some equivalency between artist and non artist via co-participation/co-creation, protests that suggest that the non-privileging of the author based on a misguided reading of Barthes (his essay on the death of the author was not a prescription) is an end in itself--for any project, the project initiator (artist) and participant are not at all on equal ground. The project would not exist without the proposal made by the artist. The artist's proposal sets the ground for the interaction, circumscribes the participants actions based on a set of rules (for lack of a better word) that can explicitly or implicitly determine how the interaction will take place. And with a few exceptions the participants look to the artist for guidance about how to participate.
So while an Allan Kaprow happening has explicit instructions about how the participants should participate, there is also an implicit understanding about the interpretation of those instructions, which is to say that the participant agrees to participate with good will in executing the vision of Allan Kaprow.
By the same token, a participant in
[shld provide examples of what talking about]
[would also be nice if we all talked about anonymity in re: this stuff. invitational participatory work that appears in public space without attribution can be quite powerful. not to say that the anonymous artist isn't still "privileged," didn't make the initial invitation, etc. - it's just yet another aspect to investigate.] [this is exactly what I'm getting at but have yet to do it. I think you or someone address(es) this elsewhere]
Coming together over me becomes most evident when the collaborative, participatory project is brought into an arts institution. Whether it takes place in an arts institution (a place it would never exist if the project were not initiated by an artist, by the artist) or the documentation of the project is exhibited in an arts institution, the role of the artist, regardless what percentage of the actual production of the project and therefore its
UNTITLED
No art has universal appeal, so no art is universally social. Every piece of art has the potential to affect an individual in a social and aesthetic way. Please create your pieces and share them with the world. Then one day, some where, some one will be influenced by one of your creations and you will have made a social mark. Keep in mind, most likely, you won't know it, and will have forgotten about the piece. You will look at the piece as a prelude to what you are currently working on, you will see its flaws and simplicity. Don't concern yourself about this, for it is a fresh piece to new eyes. There will be love, take this love and put it in your heart. Remember, you create art for everyone, not just yourself.
Is the point, to Art?
Did you come to art? I mean, art as the verb, the active, the act of.
Did you come for recognition? For kinship? For socializing?
What is your point? To write, to draw, to sing, to play, to act, to lie, to truth, to art?
what point?
To ramble and ask questions? Is this why I have come? We have come?
What then is it? this art. What makes it? Who decides? What or who shall judge?
What constricts? What boundaries? What rules shall govern?
Academia says we MUST know the rules in order to break them.
They are broken each and every day by those without teaching.
And they are held steadfast in boxes by those who learned too well to remember the freedom of breaking them. these rules.
Both traditional and renegade, tell us to learn the old – no, to reject it and this shiny new put it to memory. “This is the style of our times.”
“That is traditional literature -- this, this is the new art.”
“This is dangerous.”
But how dangerous can it be, when you take those rules to rip in half and hand me new, a lusty list of your demands. yUr structured wilderness.
And when I hand them back, with prose, they breaks both sets, admonish me -- point it out.
The caveat: “Well, it works, so you got away with it here, but quick, back behind the apron safety of these or those tenets.”
Old or new- it matters not. The point, is FeAr. truly. no. rules. IT scares them all.
But what of the point,
to art
THEN
Why not?
To art
Say I
to think
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