Performance in D R Krise Comedy
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out the East Side of Lower Manhattan — ical filtering organisation, with the sole pur or musical comedy, Quasi theater, or conceptual alongside the famous East Side galleries — the pose of curating and nourishing the peformance art reconstruction. Pyramid, 8BC or The Limbo lounge, and con art medium. A s it stands, there is nowhere for A recent performance series at the Museum of tinued programmes at artspaces like Franklin the accomplished performer from the seventies Modern Art in New York, entitled Three Furnace, The Kitchen or PS 122, performance — a Joan Jonas or a Stuart Sherman fo r exam Evenings, that was curated in association with activities are as dense as ever. Even so, with all ple — to premier new work, or review earlier the Primitivism Exhibition, pointed to the need the fare available in New York city, dissatis pieces, in a context equal to their stature and re for just such a protective environment. A 1976 faction persists; the B A M events are considered putation, and nowhere for the 80 ’s media art work by Joan Jonas, Mirage, presented in the not as landmarks in the history of the genre, but ists to present performances in tandem with pristine (if not entirely suitable) movie theater, as the consolidation of seminal ideas from the their work, should they wish to do so. In other was nevertheless a Quietly beautiful recon seventies, polished and often beautifully pack- words there is no real institutional home for struction of images and meanings from an earli aged fo r a broader public consumption, while peformance, fo r neither the Kitchen, nor the er era. The work needed the neutrality of a m a n c e in P e rf o r C r i s i s the East Side club events, are viewed as less Franklin Furnace took the necessary steps to formal space, and the aura of historical analy than seminal entertainment. So what’s miss mature with the artists who started out with sis, to bring its quiet esthetic back to life. Like ROSELEE GOLDBERG But all is not lost on the performance front. Her «back and forth» between high and low, ing? them — a Meredith Monk or Lucinda Childs a Sol Le Witt grid or a Naumann corridorfrom The relationship between performance art and has, fo r lack o f serious consideration become An important answer to this question lies in in the early seventies, or a Laurie Anderson in the same period, the stillness and authority of the current art scene, while undoubtedly very stuck in a forward position, locked once more in the gap between the clubs and existing art- the late seventies. For the professional mood of the institution, allowed the work to mature. PEOPLE AREN’T TALKING different from what it was in the seventies, is place by the cliches that usually keep the two spaces, and BAM , between entry level perfor the current art scene demands an equivalent The performance medium now craves such a not that disconnected either. Much of the same camps apart. But its Quite the wrong time to mance and graduation as it were. For there is venue for peformance, and the broad range of context, particularly if the richness of 8 0 ’s per ABOUT PERFORMANCE ART ANY analysis suggested by the catchword for the 80s, overlook the discourse that Anderson’s work an important missing link in the existant per material a flexible facility that can exhibit the formance and its relationship to contemporary appropriation, can be applied to performance highlights, or its relationship to the many me formance venues, and that is a credible and crit current performance art forms, whether cabaret fine arts is to be effectively comprehended. MORE. OR SO SOME SAY. TAKE FOR art; fo r ju st as the new generation of fine artists dia inspired artists, whether Jack Goldstein, have, as we are all too aware, looked to the Cindy Sherman, Robert Longo, Sarah EXAMPLE A RECENT PARKETT (2) more traditional art mediums of painting and Charlesworth, David Salle, Ericka Beckman sculpture with an eye for popular references or Laurie Simmons, to name a few. For each of INTERVIEW — WITH TYPICAL culled from the media, so too peformance art these artists has a very particular understanding has assumed more traditional guises — rock of the American media culture at large, and an COMMENTS LIKE «HOW COME ALL concert, night club entertainment, Borscht Belt uncanny grasp of its generalities as much as of Performance in d r Krise comedy. its heavily disguised nuances. They are also THE PERFORMANCE ARTISTS These separate packagings of various media sophisticated exponents of work whose integrity into more familiar and apparently «legitimate» ART VON: «WIE KOMMT ES, zu diskutieren. Es findet sich (in besag is well grounded in the seventies, and who have ROSELEE GOLDBERG HAVE LEFT (NEW YORK) FOR BER disciplines have in turn made it somewhat dif travelled extensively through its philosophical tem Interview) ein einziger Hinweis auf ficult to discuss performance and fine art in passages, as well as its performance aspects. DASS ALLE PERFORMANCE Laurie Anderson, und zwar im Zusam LIN?» tandem, as was possible, and essential even, in Not to include Anderson — performance artist DIE PERFORMANCE-KUNST menhang mit Vorstellungen von «hoch» the seventies. Then performance and conceptual — in this analysis of 80 ’s fine arts, is to mis KÜNSTLER VON NEW YORK und «niedrig» (hohe Kunst und populäre Clearly, amidst the generally confusing talk art were two sides of the same coin, with per understand crucial elements of its form and con IST KEIN GESPRÄCHSTHEMA Kultur), der sich in einem gewissen Sin about graffiti art — «is it really art?» — and formance being the lively, if often paradoxical tent. NACH BERLIN GEZOGEN SIND?» ne auf den verworrenen M arkt bezieht ideological affinities — «when w ill a Barbara counterpart to conceptual art’s cerebral con MEHR. JEDENFALLS WIRD DIES und auf dessen Fähigkeit, das ganze Kruger poster attack a collector, showing its cerns. Then critics were obliged to cross bound Despite this lack of an authoritative discus Es ist ganz klar, dass innerhalb des zu Spektrum künstlerischer Angebote wie true Marxist colors?» — or, the current art aries with as much agility as the artists; now sion that maintains performance in an art con VON VERSCHIEDENEN LEUTEN meist verwirrlichen Gesprächs über ein gigantisches Krümelmonster aus der market — «do we really care about Schnabel?» no such obstacle course exists, so that the dis text, the large scale productions that Anderson Graffiti-Kunst — «ist es wirklich «Sesamstrasse» zu verschlingen. — there ’s not much room for discussion about cussion on performance is left to a handful of has mounted, as well as the annual collabora BEHAUPTET. NEHMEN WIR ZUM Kunst?» — und ideologische Neigungen Doch noch ist nicht alles verloren an the apparent waning of performance. A single writers working outside of the painting/sculp- tions produced by the Brooklyn Academy of — «an welchem Punkt wird ein Plakat der Performance-Front. Die Beziehun reference is made (in this same interview) to ture mainstream, while writing about paint M usic (BAM ), o f new opera-sized works by BEISPIEL DAS KÜRZLICH IN von Barbara Kruger, seine wahren m ar gen zwischen der Performance-Kunst Laurie A nderson, having to do with ‘high and ing, with a few exceptions, ignores performance veterans o f 20 years of performance art such as xistischen Farben aufdeckend, sich ge und der gegenwärtig herrschenden low ’ (High art and popular culture) which altogether. Lucinda Childs, Meredith Monk, Robert «PARKETT» (NO. 2) ERSCHIENE gen einen Sammler richten?» — , oder Kunst-Szene sind, obwohl zweifellos somehow relates back to the muddled market Thus, even Laurie Anderson ’s work has Wilson or Trisha Brown, have in fact firmly über den gegenwärtigen Kunstmarkt — sehr verschieden von denen der 70er and its ability to devour the fu ll spectrum of art been abandoned by art writers, as though her established the genre of performance art for the NE INTERVIEW — MIT TYPI «bedeutet uns Schnabel wirklich etwas?» Jahre, noch keineswegs gänzlich abge offerings like a giant Cookie Monster from Se success in the pop camp disQualifies her from New York Press and public. Indeed, along — nicht viel Raum bleibt, um den offen brochen. Ein guter Teil der vom Schlüs same Street. continued association with artworld esthetics. with the nightly events at clubs dotted through- SCHEN BEMERKUNGEN IN DER sichtlichen Niedergang der Performance selwort der 80er Jahre — Aneignung — PARKETT 4 1985 1 0 6 1 0 7 PARKETT 4 1985 ausgehenden Analysen kann auch auf die die beiden Lager auseinanderhalten. Furnace, The Kitchen oder PS 122, so tigen Kunstszene verlangt geradezu Titel «Three Evenings» machte die Not ruhige Schönheit wieder zum Leben zu die Performance-Kunst angewandt wer Es ist nun aber ganz und gar nicht der lebendig und so dicht wie eh und je. nach einem gleichwertigen Schauplatz wendigkeit eines derart abschirmenden erwecken. Wie ein Gitter von Sol Le- den. Wie die neue Generation der bil richtige Zeitpunkt, um den Diskurs, den Dennoch herrscht, bei allen in New für Performance, nach einem flexiblen Forums oder Schauplatzes überdeutlich. W itt oder ein Korridor von Bruce Nau- denden Künstler auf die traditionellen Andersons Werk beleuchtet, zu überse York vorhandenen Angeboten, Unzu Forum, auf dem sich die weitgespannten «Mirage», ein Werk von Joan Jonas aus man, brauchte auch dieses Werk die R u künstlerischen Methoden der Malerei hen, und auch nicht seine Beziehungen friedenheit; die Produktionen der BAM Ausdrucksformen dieses Mediums ma dem Jahre 1976, das im strengen (wenn he und Autorität der Institution, um sei und der Skulptur zurückgriff und dabei zur Arbeit vieler medieninspirierter werden weniger als Meilensteine in der nifestieren können — sei es nun Kaba nicht sogar idealen) Raum des hauseige ne Reife zu offenbaren.