Allegory of the
cave
 |
| Artist's Conception of Allegory of the Cave |
While preparing for
my midway show this summer (Brazen Bull: Traps and Veils) for exhibition this
fall semester I was experimenting with possible performance ideas I’ve had a while
ago. One such idea was to put a boxing match into performance art context. I’ve
always thought that boxing had a vital aesthetic all its own. For my Brazen Bull exhibit I have been
making several heavily layered films which make use of traditional art materials
(paint, oil, pen and ink, as well as various debris) and applying them over a
piece of glass which was leaning on a computer screen. This screen was looping
video of me doing several rather absurd gestures making various sounds. While I
applied these materials onto the glass overlay I would be simultaneously
shooting fresh films of the process. I have made several films using this
process. I have been then looping the resulting films for exhibit and
channeling the sound component through an audio transducing speaker, which was
placed inside an air compressor tank, which served as a metaphor for the Brazen
Bull…
(The term Brazen Bull refers to a torture and
execution device made in ancient Greece (Athens) by a metal worker named
Perillos. He proposed the device to Phalaris, a Tyrant of Akragas, Sicily. The
Brazen Bull was a bronze, life size, hollow bull with a latch opening. Victims
were put inside the bull and fire set underneath to roast the victims to
death. The victim had no choice
but to place his mouth over complex horn-like tubing as a final source of
oxygen. The tubing was designed in way to channel the final screams of the
victim and transmute them into the melodic sounds of a bull. While proposing
the device to Phalaris, Perillos said, “[his screams] will come to you through the pipes as the tenderest,
most pathetic, most melodious of bellowings”. )
The Brazen Bull was
conceived to serve as a metaphor for my exploration of the interstice between
the authentic and simulation. I was experimenting with the idea that in
contemporary times all forms of expression are transmuted into some form of
simulacra. As I thought about this idea in more depth this summer I finally saw
the connection between my Brazen Bull concept and the aesthetic of a fight.
Jeff Erickson
assisted me a great deal with the acquisition and transformation of my “bull”
(which for the exhibit was an appropriated air compressor). During this
association I explained to Jeff that what I wanted to do for the show was to
include a fight performance. I planned to create a small area in which the
fight would take place. I planned to drape a semi-transparent screen over that
area to create a visual separation between the fighters and the crowd. On the
night of the performance I had a camera set up and aimed directly at the screen
to film the fight. I connected an s-cable to that camera and had it connected
to a projector, which was aimed at the fighters within the fight area. My plan
was to shoot the live fight and project the fight itself in real time onto the
fight. I would then have a directional microphone aimed at the fighters and had
the sound generated from the fight channeled into the bull air compressor
transmuting the sound through the audio transducing speaker thereby completing
the metaphor of the Brazen Bull. Immediately after relating this description to
Jeff he explained the Allegory of the Cave and how my concept was a direct
commentary on its contemporary relevance. Jeff went on to explain to me that
the Allegory of the Cave is being discussed more and more in contemporary art
discourse while prognosticating what may be the next zeitgeist in contemporary
art once the postmodern project is entirely exhausted.
In short, Plato’s
parable, Allegory of The Cave was
about humans who spent their entire existence chained against the walls of a
cave. They faced the wall of the cave and their only idea of truth was in the
form of shadows cast onto the wall of the cave by real objects behind them. In
essence Plato refers to human’s sense of “reality” is not necessarily an
accurate representation but a poor copy.
In the coming semesters of my studies I plan to further explore this
concept.
On the day of the class we
were scheduled to discuss Allegory of the Cave I could think of no more
appropriate book with which to combine in our discussion than Simulations by Jean Baudrillard.
No comments:
Post a Comment