The People's Museum for Prince
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THE PEOPLE’S MUSEUM FOR PRINCE: INVERTING THE CURATORIAL LENS FROM ARTIST TO AUDIENCE. BY EMMA CATHERINE BALÁZS THIS DISSERTATION IS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY NOTE: REDACTED VERSION Images have been removed by the author of this thesis for copyright reasons. FACULTY: VICTORIAN COLLEGE OF THE ARTS DECEMBER 2018 ORCID IDENTIFIER 0000-0003-4540-8803 ABSTRACT The People’s Museum For Prince: Inverting The Curatorial Lens From Artist To Audience. This practice-based research explores an alternative model for an artist’s museum focusing on the impact of the artist on their audience. It takes form as a dissertation, and an exhibition which was held in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in May 2018 as the first iteration of the museum. This research asks how the mourning for an artist and the aftermath of their death can inform an alternative model for an artist’s museum that inverts the curatorial lens from artist to audience in order to honour the deep impact of the artist on the lives of many. Taking Prince, who died in 2016, as a case study, it analyses curatorial, institutional and public practices relating to the musician and his audience, focusing on the public mourning for Prince and the rapid transformation of Paisley Park, Prince’s home and studio complex, into a new museum. The alternative artist’s museum model proposed is a curatorial response to the discrepancy between how Prince was mourned by the public and how he was officially memorialised by an institution. The research is situated within the frame of institutional critique, new institutionalism, and critical exhibition practices, and also within the context of recent contemporary museum exhibitions that take the musician as their subject. The research finds that an artist’s audience provides an alternative source of expertise and rich content for a museum. This new museum model works to transform the essence of the public testimonials and the other creative expressions enacted in the wake of the artist’s death into the generative centre of the museum. By drawing on the diverse, subjective perspectives of the artist’s audience, and through collecting and presenting their stories, creative works and biographical objects, a multidimensional portrait of the artist can emerge. This new model for an artist’s museum that places the audience’s experience at the centre has application beyond Prince to any artist who was deeply beloved by many. 2 Declaration: I declare this thesis comprises only my original work towards the degree of Doctor of Philosophy; due acknowledgement has been made in the text to all other material used; and the thesis is fewer than the maximum word limit in length, exclusive of tables, maps, bibliographies and appendices as approved by the Research Higher Degrees Committee. Emma Catherine Balázs 3 Acknowledgements I wish to thank my supervisor Dr Elizabeth Presa for her support throughout the PhD process. My thanks to Dr Danny Butt, chair of my thesis committee, for his advice and guidance. Special thanks to Dr Yvette Grant for invaluable advice and good spirits in the final stages of the project, and to Nathan Parry, Liaison Librarian at the University of Melbourne. Thank you to my mentor and dear friend Carol Becker for her ongoing, longstanding support, and her strong encouragement to pursue my PhD and all my creative dreams. Special thanks to Chiara Bernasconi, Louisa Bufardeci, Marie Kruger and Becki Schultz and Suzanne Wint for their ongoing, positive encouragement. Thank you to Georgia Richter for editorial assistance, steadfast friendship, and unflagging moral support throughout the entire process, from early ideas through to last punctuation point, without whom the full expression of this project is inconceivable. Thank you to all the participants of the exhibition. Thank you to Daniel Pratt for donating his services to photograph the exhibition and to Prince DJ Michael Holtz for donating his services to play at the Purple Preview event. Thank you to the staff and artists at the Solar Arts Building. Special thanks to the core exhibition team in Minneapolis for their generous help making the exhibition: Jill Boogren, Carolin Drewitz (working from Germany), Rebecca Langason, Kevin Nickelson, Michelle Streitz, Heidi Vader and Kristen Zschomler. Deep gratitude to Suzanne Wint and Jennifer Umolac whose extraordinary creative and practical participation and help in a thousand ways made this project both possible and joyful. I am grateful for the Australian Postgraduate Award (which became Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarship in 2017) which supported me throughout my candidature, and for the Jim Marks Postgraduate Scholarship, which provided vital and timely financial assistance to help the realization of the exhibition. Finally, I wish to thank my partner Arun Saldanha and my mother Ann Wilson for their invaluable, loving support, expressed in all dimensions of being. 4 List of Figures The images in this thesis contain third party copyright material except for photos that are by the author. Permissions have been obtained only from photographers Steven Cohen, Gail George, Daniel Pratt and Arun Saldanha. All other permissions have not been obtained, thus the images have been removed from this redacted version of the dissertation. Figure 1a. Cover Page of Star Tribune (Minneapolis), April 22, 2016. http://live.startribune.com/Event/Breaking_news_Death_at_Paisley_Park?Page=1 Figure 2a. Young mourner at First Avenue, April 21, 2016. Photo by Renee Jones Schneider, AP, https://www.concordmonitor.com/prince-tributes-across-America-1697611,accessed December 8, 2018. Figure 2b. First Avenue Prince Party, April 21 2016. Photo by Tony Brandt. Minnesota Historical Society repository “History is Now! Remembering Prince photograph collection”, http://collections.mnhs.org/cms/display.php?irn=11454367, accessed December 8, 2018. Figure 2c. Prince’s Gold Star at First Avenue, May 5, 2016. Photo by Jim Mone. AP. https://www.thecurrent.org/feature/2016/10/12/purple-pilgrimage-prince-fans-making-the-trek-to- minnesota. Figure 2d. Bob Staake, Purple Rain, New Yorker Cover, May 2, 2016. Accessed December 8 2018, https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/cover-story-2016-05-02 Figure 3. Mourners at Paisley Park, April 21, 2016 Photo by Nate Ryan, MPR, https://www.mprnews.org/story/2016/04/21/photos-prince-mourners-weep, Accessed December 8, 2018. Figure 4. Rainbow over Paisley Park, April 21, 2016. Photo by Carlos Gonzales, Star Tribune, https://www.mprnews.org/story/2016/04/26/ex-prince-employees-hope-paisley-park-becomes- museum, accessed December 8, 2018. Figure 5. Paisley Park spontaneous memorial, April 2018. Photo by Scott Olson. Getty Images. https://www.theverge.com/2016/8/25/12646862/prince-home-studio-paisley-park-minnesota-museum accessed December 8, 2018. Figure 6. Fans visit Paisley Park, April 22, 2016. Photo by Scott Olson. Getty Images, http://fortune.com/2016/04/26/prince-paisley-park-museum-graceland/. Accessed December 8 2018. 5 Figure 7. Notes to Prince from around the world by Kristin Kokkila, August 2018. Photo by the author. Figure 8. Paisley Park Fence in August 2016. Photo by the author. Figure 9. “Be A Good Neighbor” Banner on stripped fence, September 2018. Photo by www.swnewsmedia.com. Figure 10. Kristin Kokkila in Prince jersey waits to present at Chanhassen City Council Meeting, Oct 3, 2016. Photo provided by Kristin Kokkila. Figure 11. Joel Weinshanker at Chanhassen City Council Meeting, October 3, 2016. (Screenshot from Chanhassen City video), https://www.ci.chanhassen.mn.us/240/Agendas-Minutes-Videos, accessed October 3, 2016. Figure 12. Fence tribute recreated inside Paisley Park Museum. October 2016. Photo by CBS. https://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2017/04/18/prince-paisley-park-treasure-artifacts/ accessed December 8, 2018. Figure 13. Prince4Ever fence, Paisley Park carpark, April 2017. Photo by Gail George. Figure 14. Fence display at My Name is Prince exhibition, Amsterdam, June 2018. Photo by Arun Saldanha. Figure 15.a, b. Fence at Riley Creek, just beyond Paisley Park boundary, October 2016. Photos by the author, October 2016. Figure 16a. Riley Creek Underpass on Prince’s birthday June 7, 2017. Photo by the author. Figure 16b. Riley Creek Underpass, January 26, 2017. Photo by the author. Figure 17. Riley Creek underpass and tribute fence on April 21, 2017. Photo by Steven Cohen, NPR, https://www.npr.org/2017/04/21/524881332/in-the-wake-of-princes-death?t=1544551424830. Accessed December 8, 2018. Figure 18. Figure 18. Nina Simone’s Childhood Home, North Carolina. Photo by National Trust for Historic Preservation, https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/nina-simone-childhood-home. Accessed December 8, 2018. Figure 19. Neverland Ranch, 2018, Photo by Carolyn Kaster, AP. https://www.businessinsider.com/michael-jacksons-neverland-ranch-is-being-sold-for-100-million-2015- 5?r=US&IR=T, Accessed December 8, 2018. 6 Figure 20. Joel Weinshanker, Opening Day at Paisley Park Museum, October 6, 2016. Photo by David Joles, Star Tribune. https://www.swnewsmedia.com/chanhassen_villager/news/local/paisley-park-museum-the-first- day/article_a0575962-1fea-5b3e-8453-d356ea86a875.html, Accessed December 8, 2018. Figure 21. The author in Studio B, at Prince’s piano, Oct 6, 2016. Photo by Paisley Park Museum staff. Figure 22. The author in Studio B, at Prince’s piano, Oct 9, 2017. Photo by Paisley Park Museum staff. Figure 23. Visitors at Elvis’s grave in the meditation garden, Graceland. September 2016, photo by the author. Figure 24. Prince’s urn. Photo by Foreverence. https://foreverence.com. Accessed June 22, 2017 Figure 25. Paisley Park Atrium, October 2016. Photo by AP. https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/oct/06/prince-paisley-park-estate-museum-minnesota Figure 26. Prince’s Bedroom at Paisley Park, ca. April 2018, photo by vogue.com, still taken as screen shot from video on Vogue.com.