The Fantasy Beyond Control Yukun

The first thing that came out of my head was magic when it talks about interactive work in The Fantasy Beyond Control by Lynn Hershman. It’s hard to believe anyone in this world doesn’t like magic. It’s a great interactive art but I’m not sure if magic counts for performance art when I try to link this to the other reading. Magic has a fairly low status compared to other forms of theatre. Jerry Seinfeld talked about it, “What is the point of the magician? He comes on, he fools you, you feel stupid, show’s over. You never know what’s actually happened. It’s like, here’s a quarter. Now it’s gone. You’re a jerk.” Unfortunately Seinfeld is right for the majority of magic performances. The issue of magic as an art form is often discussed by magicians, but not so much in the literature on performance arts. Magic is mostly seen as a second rate type of performance art with nothing much to offer beyond frivolous entertainment. Back to the article, one thing that the author mentioned is that “computer systems will eventually reflect the personality and the biases of users. Yet these systems only appear to talk back.” Human-computer interaction is a kind of interactive art. The author thought and interactive media is important because the perceptions became the key to reality. In Art as Performative Enactment, the sequence talked about playing the game attract me,” ‘I am playing the game’; ‘we are playing the game’; ‘the game is being played through our movements’; and finally ‘the game plays itself through our movements.’” This describes the key of playing a game. It shows the interaction between the game and the player as a round way trip. This is a simple piece of interactive art I found that can explain the idea well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCMhGRyUKaY.

Danielle Rennalls: Art as Performative Enactment

According to the article art as a performative enactment is an idea developed by Hans Georg Gadamer that consists of three elements; play (“…perfomative enactment through movement…”), symbol “(…[existence of] self-presentation that enables self-recognition) and festival/fest (“…enacting an experience of community in solidarity).

The purpose of all three elements in relation to art as a performative enactment and essentially what ties them together is the fact that they possess the qualities of a double-sided sword. In essence these elements do not work solely in one direction, but rather forwards and backwards simultaneously. Standing alone these elements lose there meaning, but together they build off each other creating the concept known as art as a performative enactment.

Take for instance the element of play. As stated by the author of this article, “Movement is the key to play – but only secondarily the movement of the player.” This essentially means that the main purpose of play is not player’s movement but rather it is the player’s interaction with the game with the intention of allowing the game to take over his/her movement. “The purpose of the game is simply to be played so that the game becomes master over the players…It is proper to say in sequence: ‘I am playing the game’; ‘we are playing the game’; ‘the game is being played through our movements’; and finally ‘the game plays itself through our movements.’” This illustrates the notion of the double-sided sword because the concept of play is not solely one directional from player to game, but rather works both ways generating a relationship from game to player as well. Essentially if the player does not allow the game to take over, they will have no success in their attempt to embody the movements needed to defeat the game.

Though the notions underlying symbol and festival may be different from that of play, the concept of needing interaction between the element, the artist and audience remains the same. Take for instance Steven Cohen’s performance in 2013 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xsx9gtQM8f8, this is one that I believe represents the element of symbol for it “…calls our being into question [and] transports us into another order of things…” His performance is in fact the existence of self-presentation.

Though I would never allow myself to do something so extreme, it is fascinating the lengths people go create a piece and to embody the elements of performance art.

Art as Performative and Fantasy beyond control- Karina

Art as a Performative Act presents Hans-Georg Gadamar ideas on art. He says that the “truth of art asserts itself when the work engages us and says something to us about what it means to be ourselves in the world.” The truth also originates from the three concepts of play, symbol, and festival. Symbol is by far the most recognized concept of art as art as “I see and have the thing itself, but only in materials that are not literally the thing itself”.  In performance art, the body is able to play the role of many symbols through the context that you build around it or the movement (play) you are making. If the art is a live performance art such as Marina Abramovic’s piece “The Artist is present”, it highlights the play and festival components of the art as people are asked to engage in the piece themselves or are a part of the spectating group. All art has the three components that Gadamar was talking about, but when the art is an actual literal performance whether it is live or not, these concepts are magnified because it calls for the viewer and the artist to be engaged in it on a higher level.

In the Fantasy Beyond Control, the author really stresses the importance of interactive media because it calls for more participation from the viewer. Lynn states “The very act of viewing a captured image creates a distance from the original event. The captured image becomes a relic of the past.” Lynn’s importance of interactive media is that it creates a changing timeline based on the interaction and “replaces some of the nostalgic longings with a sense of identity, purpose, and hope”. I agree that interactive media allows us not to get stuck in the past but I feel that some pieces that aren’t interactive, if done right, don’t get stuck in “nostalgic longings”. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gYBXRwsDjY

For example, Olivier de Sagazan’s performance piece recording  is a recording with actions that will never change and it will always be the same, but what he does completely dissociated me from viewing the video as a video and engaged me fully. It made me feel uncomfortable to view what he was doing in front of me and brought me in visually but also emotionally though his outbursts and actions.