Performance Art
• In 1975, body artist Chris Burden announced that he would perform a new work of art at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago. The work of art consisted mainly of his lying down on the floor beneath a large sheet of plate glass near which was a clock. Previously, he had earned his master’s degree at the University of California at Irvine by staying for five days in a locker. In the locker with him was a 5-gallon jug of water, and — for obvious reasons — a 5-gallon jug that started out empty. Students heard about the piece and talked to him through the locker’s grillwork. This pleased Mr. Burden, who says, “I was a box with ears and a voice.” At the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, Mr. Burden lay still for many hours. The officials of the museum were worried about him and whether the work of art would result in permanent damage to his body — after all, he was not eating or drinking, not even taking a sip of water. Finally, after 45 hours, they placed a pitcher of water by him. Immediately, Mr. Burden got up, went to the bathroom, returned with a hammer, and smashed the clock, officially ending the work of art. He also had a sealed envelope that contained a note that explained that the work of art had three pieces: himself, the piece of glass, and the clock. The note also stated that the work of art would end whenever the museum officials acted on any of the three pieces. By bringing the pitcher of water to him, they had ended the work of art, which, by the way, was titled “Doomed.” “I thought perhaps the piece would last several hours,” Mr. Burden says. “I thought maybe they’d come up and say, ‘Okay, Chris, it’s 2 a.m. and everybody’s gone home and the guards are on overtime and we have to close up.’ That would have ended the piece, and I would have broken the clock, recording the elapsed time. On the first night, when I realized they weren’t going to stop the piece, I was pleased and impressed that they had placed the integrity of the piece ahead of the institutional requirements of the museum. On the second night, I thought, ‘My God, don’t they care anything at all about me? Are they going to leave me here to die?’”
• Being a performance artist is like having a license to be creative and have fun. For example, Ohio University School of Art graduate students Nate Lareau and Marin Abell saw 2,400 ping-pong balls for sale on eBay. They immediately bought them for $80, then set about finding ways to make use of them. One thing they did was to put them in a dryer (on the tumble with no-heat setting) at a coin-operated laundry (with permission). According to Mr. Lareau, “That was a good one. The ping-pong balls in the dryer created quite a racket. They sounded like a hailstorm, and looked a little like a weather system.” Another thing they did was to simply pour the ping-pong balls onto a street on a hill. The street was lined with bricks, and the sound the balls created as they bounced down the hill was interesting — like rain hitting a roof. Finally, Mr. Abell and a friend took the balls and a ping-pong-ball shooter and played a game where Mr. Abell tied 10 tennis rackets to his body and tried to hit the ping-pong balls being shot at him. Mr. Abell said he actually got very good at hitting the balls. Mr. Lareauand Mr. Abell still have the ping-pong balls, and the balls may yet appear in future pieces of performance art they create.
• In 1968, on the streets of Munich, Viennese performance artist Valie Export engaged in what she called “Touch Cinema.” She cut out holes in a box so that she could wear it around her torso: one hole was for her head, two holes were for her arms, and two holes were cut in front. Inside the box were her bare breasts, which were hidden by the box and by a cloth that covered the opening in the box in front of her breasts. She told passersby, “This box is the cinema hall. My body is the screen. But this cinema hall is not for looking — it is for touching.” She would then invite passersby to put their hands through the holes in front and touch her for 13 seconds. Some people took her up on the offer, and one thing that she noticed about the men was that they always looked her in the eyes as they touched her.
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Copyright by Bruce D. Bruce; All Rights Reserved
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THE COOLEST PEOPLE IN ART
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