Week 3: Performing the moment

In her essay, Olson’s main focus is the discussion of decontextualization, “auratic distance”, and telepresence concerning the documentation of performance art via photography. Since photography has long raised the issue of lessening authenticity and destroying a work's "aura", the same line of reasoning is applied to the use of photography in performance. Some performances and their various traces emphasize the increase of these qualities, such as Burden’s “Shoot” in 1971 and more recently Labat’s “Hooter’s Project.” Other performances change the audience’s relationship around by making them instrumental yet distant to the actual performance, such as Goldberg’s “human robot” and the website “Do It” at e-flux.com. In all these cases, the documentation of the work is essential, yet still only serves as a single moment in time of the actual performance. The essay seemed to focus on photography as the main means of preserving “proof” of a performance, but while it can be useful I think that the means of preservation should be fitting and keep as true to the original performance as possible. In my opinion the reproduction doesn’t have the same effect as the actual act of performance, but I think its existence is still critical to the longevity and accessibility of the work.

http://www.berkeley.edu/news/berkeleyan/2002/04/24_tele.html