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News & ArtsFriday, August 28, 2009
Visual Art Yoko Ono's People Give Seattle Artist the Smackdown
Posted by Jen Graves on Fri, Aug 28, 2009 at 11:09 AM
Dear Amanda Mae,Michael Darling, the curator of "Painting Under Attack" at the Seattle Art Museum, has forwarded a copy of your letter to him, and your statement about your action.
I am certain that you were motivated to do your action by fine principles and good intentions. However, I believe that you were wrong to do what you did. You acted as a kind of "art police," presuming that you knew better what the artists intention was than those many others who had either hammered a nail or added some object to the work. What you characterize as "pocket garbage" might well have been gestures of love or items of deep emotional content. Even a piece of chewing gum stuck to the surface would have had a connection to the mouth of the person who put the gum on the surface. Hannah Wilke made numerous sculptures casting chewing gum that she had chewed in gold.
There are numerous ambiguous works of art. Art is not just a linear or two-dimensional domain. Think, for instance, of Man Ray's Object to Be Destroyed, which existed for many years as an enigmatic post-Dada sculpture. At one point, a literalist took it upon him or herself to actually destroy the object. Pity, as we no longer have that original perplexing work to consider. There are only replicas. Arakawa made a painting, titled Steal This Painting. Which a group of art students did one day. But was that really the intention of Arakawa?
I think you have to consider art in a much deeper, more profound sense than you do. And also, to have greater respect for the artist, and not presume that you know what she intends. If the artist had instructed the work to be returned to its "austere" beginnings, that would have been her prerogative. But as she did not, you didn't have the right to dictate what the artist's intention was, and to rob those many people who had interacted with the work before you of their contribution to this process. A better approach would have been to contact the artist, and say how disturbed you were at the perceived change of the intention of the work, and ask whether it could be restored.
A participatory work is of course very different from a static work, and surprising things happen. So one could argue that your participation was just as justifiable as anyone else's participation. As I know that you were motivated by good intentions, I would like to think of it this way.
All the best,
Jon—
YOKO ONO EXHIBITIONS
Jon Hendricks
Curator
1
Of course, Mae's actions only add to the fabric of the work. Maybe someone should print this letter and attach it to the work.
8
DID MS ONO INTEND 4 US TO HAMMER INTO PAINTING? LET US PONDER ENIGMATIC POST-POST.
DID MS ONO INTEND TO BREAK UP AWFUL SHITTY BAND? WHO KNOWS?
DOES MS ONO HAVE A FAGGY CHUBSTER OF A SON? DEF.
DOES MS ONO MEAN ANYTING RELEVANT TO ME? IDK.
I THINK I NEED TO PONDER.
YOKO BABE, YOU'VE BEEN HIDING A FASCISTISTIC STREAK 4 YRS. PLZ STOP PRETENDING TO DECONSTRUCT OR HAVE TWERKING KNAWLEDGZ OF KNTRKULTR OR ANYTING ALSE.
9
Amen
10
11
13
of a lot of Art
is that there are no Rules,
just Process.
*spins around until she fall down*
Ouch. Saying that to an artist is like saying 'your momma' to someone whose mom just died.
Though I think the letter is wrong. It should have read:
"I think you have to consider art in a much shallower, less profound sense than you do."
Mae's error was taking it too seriously. I get the impression that she resented people's involvement because she didn't think their contributions were serious enough or worthy to be added to the piece. She was probably right, too. But at the same time, it wasn't her call.
Either way, the letter assumes she doesn't think of art in a serious or profound way, which is obviously not true, and reads (to me) like a petty swipe. They both come across as petty now, and that makes her 'excavation' seem less sacrilegious.
It focuses directly on what was insupportable about Mae's project: her belief that her need to interact with the work gave her the right to dismantle the interactions of others.
She did not know better.
There was a light blue plastic booth about 3 feet square and six feet tall with a door on the front; ordinary people took turns going inside and adding their contribution to the art. There was even a handy little seat to sit on while taking your turn. The resulting mosaic was mostly various shades of brown and green, and with assorted textures, squishy smooth or chunky lumps. It is exquisite. (It even has an aromatic quality)
For a mere $23,400 we would be willing to let SAM sit it in their lobby for a month.
Of course, tax revenues from sales of artwork in this country have always exceeded any "public funding" by billions of dollars. Perhaps next time you'll re-consider before attempting to think.
22
This whole thing is hard for me to get too concerned with, but I do find it very odd that people keep returning to the "you have to interact with this piece of art in THIS undefined way, not THAT one!"
It's an interactive piece. There are so many possible interpretations of the instruction "hammer a nail". I'd like to see audiences get a little more creative, if only to relieve the boredom.
26
Call me old fashioned, but IMO modern art went downhill after dada.
27
Dear Mr Hendricks,
Thank you for your thoughtful words on my recent performance. For the record, I am not a hammer wielding lunatic looking for a Duchamp "Fountain" to destroy, nor a cheeky art student pulling a stunt. My motivations were difficult to describe so the term "austere" appears as a reference point to the aesthetic of simplicity prevalent in fluxus works.
Artists at best are philosophically productive, and I look for meaning in their works through a contextual network consisting of: other works within their oeuvre, art from their peers/predecessors, and the socio-political framework they were created within. One of my favorite Ono pieces is titled "Mending Piece" which I first viewed a few years ago in the Mori Art Museum of Tokyo. This work is a small installation consisting of a china hutch, table, and a large pile of broken shattered plates. On the day I visited, three performers were seated at the table carefully placing ever smaller shards on top of other pieces with ikebana-like precision, bundling them up then returning them to the china hutch. Deeply moved by the domestic and yet universal implications of this piece, I have taken a particular interest in works which point towards a philosophical practice of constant care in a world of tides. Interestingly, within Maciunas' Fluxus Manifesto is the imperative to "promote a revolutionary flood and tide in art," thus embracing both creative and destructive forces occurring simultaneously. With this in mind, my performance was analogous to a small undertow, pulling the water back (temporarily) to reveal what lies beneath.
While Darling interprets Ono's "Piece to Hammer a Nail" in a purely additive sense, I have added, in the abstract. It is my opinion that I did not "rob those many people who had interacted with the work" as all contents I had removed were placed in the same storage location with the errant pieces that fall from the wall.
You are indeed correct that participatory works are conduits for surprising outcomes, put another way, the artist may conceive of the outcome but has relinquished control of it. Regrettably, neither you nor Darling saw my addition within your perceived (delimited) potentiality for the piece - an oversight or an underestimate?
Yours,
Amanda Mae
"Please don't touch the (touchable) art."
http://www.arthereandnow.com/2009/10/ple…
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