Week 1

Performance Art

Martha Wilson discusses her theory on the beginning of performance art with the Italian Futurists’ act of tossing thousands of copies of their manifesto off a clock tower. She further supports her theory by stating that performance is essentially about confrontation and treats time as its main subject. Wilson also brings up Conceptual art, which emphasizes the idea over any tangible manifestation of it, in connection with performance. I personally sometimes struggle with this notion in relation to certain works of art, but I feel the concept fits well with regard to performance. I also agree with her contrast of performance to theater as well as performance’s ultimate goal of attempting to change the world.

http://the-artists.org/MovementView.cfm?id=8A01EE98%2DBBCF%2D11D4%2DA93500D0B7069B40

Futurist Manifesto

Marinetti lays out the core beliefs of the Futurists in his manifesto, placing the ultimate emphasis on destroying the past and embracing speed and revolution in their work. Additionally, they believed that there was no beauty except in struggle and defiance. In many ways their concepts correlate strongly to those of performance art. Both possess the spirit of confrontation and focus on time as something in constant motion that must be kept up with. While I agree with these notions, I feel that the Futurists wanted to take them to an unnecessary extreme. I also found the strong underpinnings of violence to be somewhat disturbing in their manifesto.

http://www.lycos.com/info/futurism.html

Interview with Allan Kaprow

In his interview, Kaprow discusses his background and work as a performance and installation artist. When asked about his work, he brings up the fact that the words “performance” and “installation” were actually replacements for “happening” and “environment”. To him, this shows a shift in the focus of performance artists, many of which more closely resemble theater than what the previous readings define as performance. He also talks about his desire to give artists more options for expression rather than completely doing away with the things of the past in the manner of the Futurists. Also, Kaprow talked about how he worked at the same time as the Fluxus artists while doing his own work independently and on his own, which I found interesting.

http://wwar.com/masters/k/kaprow-allan.html