Sarah's Soundscape Resubmit

https://soundcloud.com/sharari/harari-soundscape-resubmit-1

Art as Performative Enactment

Art as Performative Enactment

“Intermedia only exists or comes into beng as such through the interaction between objective elements and the subjectivity of the viewer.” The author claims in the passage that viewer is the one who responsible to interpret the elements in a piece for themselves. Base on this statement, the author asks, “What is art? And where does it come from?” in the later paragraph. I think this is such a huge question that won’t be able to just answer in one sentences. The author provide what is not necessary to be an art – the pleasure provoke by aesthetic consciousness. Personally, I describe art as blank and tasteless. Later the author provide the three concept that Gadamer build for the origins of the work of art- play, symbol, and festival.

Play:

According to Gadamer, movement is the key of play. It is interesting the author give out an example of how the relationship works between game and game players.  “The game is being played through our movements turns to the game play itself though our movement.”  The player was brought to a higher level of the game. And when the game play for the spectators, the spectators were also involve in the movement of play.

I think about the sleeper in MOMA.

http://youtu.be/VXkmI-8wLCE

Actress Tilda Swinton sleeps in a box in MOMA for art installation. Sleeping is defiantly not an art, but sleeping in a box in front of a lot of spectators becomes an behavior art in MOMA. I think sleeping is the “movement” in the play. And the spectators inevitably involved in the artwork, which makes sleeping an art.

Symbols:

Symbols are the flavors of an artwork, which provoke emotions and feelings of viewers.  I immediately think of Vivian Maier, a great female photographer. Her photographs are stunning art pieces. Her works are full of energy and delivering the massage and feeling of voyaging. Voyeurism is the symbol of her artworks to me.  The people in her photograph, not every photo, but a lot of them did not aware of the camera when the photo was taken. She caught the motion of the reality, and since then would the people who in the camera saw themselves in the most real and subjective way.

http://www.vivianmaier.com/portfolios/new-york-1/

Festival(fest):

Work of art works in the community just like the way a festival does. The work of art unites everyone in the community through its communicative function. I am totally agreed with the statement. This might explant the phenomenon of why there are so many garbage movies, which we clearly know they are intolerable to watch, but we still watch them. Because we are not care about if the movie we are watching is good at all. We care about can this movie help us provoke conversations with others. We consume the films, in stead of enjoy the film.

Response to Readings

In “The Fantasy Beyond Control”, the basic idea is that interactive systems of media are important to media and the viewer because they are required to react.  At the very end of the reading, there is an important sentence that describes the importance of these interactive systems: “Participating personally in the discovery of values that affect and order their lives, allows individuals to dissolve the division that separates them from subversive control, and replaces some of the nostalgic longings with a sense of identity, purpose and hope.” This is important to the viewers because when they have a sense of purpose, they can better enjoy the media they are viewing and participating in.

In the second reading, “Art as Performative Enactment”; the idea of intermedia is heavily expressed. “In intermedia, the subjective side of the experience is essential and integral to the work of art.” This sentence is critical in tying together this reading and “The Fantasy Beyond Control”. What I mean by this is that intermedia is crucial to providing interactive media where the viewer is not just viewing the media, but consciously participating in it as well. The reading verifies this point by stating that, “The viewer has no choice but to construct meanings on his or her own out of the interactions in consciousness between different elements; there are no given meanings.” Intermedia is the key to increasing interactive systems of media, and it will continue to progress the participation of the viewers.

In this photographer’s galleries, you can find very artistic photographs that combine hundreds of photos to make one unique photograph. The photographer uses milk, and in some cases just water, to essentially clothe the models. In one of his galleries, he recreates popular pinup photographs from the 1940’s and 50’s. He also uses milk to create stunning affects using their splashes and the way it flows down the bodies of the models.

Milk Photography

Art as Performative Enactment - Response

The article discusses the three major parts in performance art. These three parts are: play, symbol, and festival. The play are the characters and their movements in the piece. The symbols are things that relate to the piece and give it feeling and emotion. The festival is how the piece draws an audience, a community of people that it speaks to, together. These three parts in performance art can also be found in movies thus making movies art as well. There are movements and actions of characters in a film, there are objects, settings, music, etc that all show symbolism in certain scenes of the film. Lastly, movies draw an audience and bring a community of people together. When people see a trailer of a movie on tv that "speaks" to them, something that they find interesting, they go to the movie theater and watch it. These examples show how video is an art.

The emotion of the scene that I've posted from Inception is set through the three major parts of the art. The actions, words, movements, settings, tone of voices, etc of the characters all help in giving the audience the sense of emotion that the filmmaker was trying to portray. The filmmaker's use of symbols also help in adding to the emotion.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCTAJ00nIlI

Response to Art as a performative Act.

This is a vary interesting article talking about how performance is involved in being a form of art. In this response, I also want to mention a movie--Run Lola Run. (which is mentioned by Jonah in his response.) At the beginning of the movie, cartoon character and real character are both involved which is very fascinating. The movie is containing three similar plots of how Lola helps her boyfriend Manni repay the 100000 marks. Each plot is set in similar environment but different action by the same people, thus different results. For example, Lola would meet the same people during her run in all o the iterations: a woman carries a baby car, a man riding a bike, Mr. Meier, her Pappa and a man driving an ambulance. However, the processes that they meet Lola are different. For example, at the first iteration, Lola runs through before Meier’s car comes; at the second iteration, Lola jumps over Mr. Meier’s car; at the third iteration, Lola crashes to Mr.Meier’s car and figures out the driver is Mr. Meier. I believe these differences have consequences for each of the three outcomes. For example, at the first iteration, Lola doesn’t know how to use a gun and Manni tells her how to manipulate.  However, at the second iteration, it turns out that Lola already knows the way of using a gun. Therefore, each of the iteration is not separate from each other. But we also can say that the iterations are separated as although each of the iterations has parallel plots, three of the iterations have different endings. I find this is a very good and innovative idea to make a performance video by introducing a similar plot with different reaction thus producing a totally different ending.

Besides, I found a very amazing performance video. The video is making in a totally dark area in which all performers wear in black but with light on them.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Rot9uaVO8s

Performance Art/Fantasy Response and the Stanley Parable

Each invention of new technology has been followed with new forms of art made possible by that technology. Their relationship has been present ever since people figured out how to make paint and canvas. They are intrinsically intertwined and yet also separate entities in our lives. Especially with the invention of modern technology, such as televisions, computers, etc., they lead separate yet linked existences. One of the reasons they lend themselves so well to one another is that the best art, according to Art as a Performative act, “tells us something about what it means to be ourselves in the world. Technology is so linked to each of our lives at this point, that to use technology or make a commentary on technology is to comment on our lives.

Taking this one step further, one can make art interactive through use of appropriate technology, such as tough-screens, joysticks, buttons, and others. This allows people to choose what to take away from each piece. One of the best recent examples of interactive art, in my opinion, is the game “The Stanley Parable.” In this video game, you have the ability to choose exactly where you want to go and what you want to do. You can choose to either listen to the narrator (who is hilarious, incidentally) or strike out on your own path and do you own thing. It is the most interactive game I have ever played and the amount of creativity that went into making it is astounding. The map, by itself, is enormous and there are hundreds of different endings, depending on which combination of choices you make. I have included a link to the trailer for “The Stanley Parable” which I think is a good introduction to what the game is all about.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1S796fXtl4

The Purpose of the Game: Response to Art as Performative Enactment

“The purpose of the game is simply to be played so that the game becomes master over the players. Then and only then does the player enter the zone where the game plays itself through the players” (71).

 I found this passage exceedingly interesting because, for me, it evokes the ‘90s German film Run Lola Run, enhancing the themes the movie toys with. Through an innovative narrative structure, the film explores the tension between the ideas of human agency and predestination. To what degree are we in control of our lives? Do our choices matter, or are they merely the means through which a greater, divine plan is carried out?   

Things become even more interesting when we consider the movie’s aesthetic design. By disrupting the space-time continuum and fragmenting reality into “levels,” the film takes on the feel of a videogame, with the titular hero playing the role of the gaming avatar (with her shock of red hair, she looks the part too). The movie’s opening (see below) features a recurring character, here mysteriously removed from the plot, speaking directly to viewers about “the game,” of which they are a part of for the next 90 minutes. He lays out the rules then sets the plot in motion. So the notion of “the game” enters the picture, as well as the viewer’s participation in the game’s unfolding.  

If, indeed, experiencing art can be thought of as a game, the act of viewing Run Lola Run creates a fascinating meta-reality for viewers. The film, structured like a game, invites us to question Lola’s agency in the writing of her own story. Is she the player or, as her status as an avatar suggests, the one being played? Take a step back, and we have our role as viewers as outlined by Art as Performative Enactment. According to the article, we as the audience are “players” in the “game” of the artwork, relinquishing our agency so that we can then play by the rules of the game. This analysis of the art-audience relationship fits curiously well with the themes of Run Lola Run; if we are playing by the rules, are we in control, or is all freedom illusory?  With this question, we take a final step back, mapping the experience of the movie onto our own reality, perhaps itself a game or artwork with an unknown creator or artist.

Opening of Run Lola Run:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqHipUWLGGY

In the spirit of our upcoming performance pieces, here's a clip from Holy Motors:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lR9ktdI4LFM

In camera edit

https://vimeo.com/77015855

FMS 161 Project 2.

https://vimeo.com/77428018