Kumbaya!
I like what Bourriaud recommends as an
approach to perhaps untangle the Gordian Knot of absolutes and the zero sum
axiom, “ for one ideology to live another must die”. He seems to embrace a
narrative that remains indeterminate, dynamic and ever evolving according more
ethereal methodologies in social bonding. He proposes inhabiting the world in a
better way versus a resignation to evolutions. These evolutions, strike me as a
typically (left brained) linear, modes operandi. Operating at full strength in the form of global capitalism.
Bourriaud promotes what appears to be a
non-westernized, holistic approach.
No more imaginary utopias but actual ways to occupy our space in the
existing real as he writes. He advocates more participatory approaches to
aesthetic mediations.
I would like to
address this in terms of what Suzi Gablik suggests artists do to disrupt the
status quo. She writes that the conformist’s mind does not grow without some
form of disruption. This idea seems intrinsically linked to Bourraud’s idea of
an ever-evolving narrative. The idea of ever evolving means it has no
connection with an inevitable outcome. This moving narrative is, in my mind, a
broad unending series of micro disruptions (in the form of unpredictable participatory aesthetic acts) revealing new ways at every
advance. I would add that in these
narratives that the qualitative measure be removed so as to allow the fractal
beauty of innate human movements to flourish. The western concept that
virtually every act must be choreographed is antithetical to Bourriaud’s
relational model.
Bourriaud
seems to say that model for living which can stand the test of time are
hampered by the jungle a hardened absolutes.(thanks again to industrial capitalism)
However, regardless
of how I may feel about Bourriaud’s relational aesthetics I need to remove my
rose tinted glasses long enough to examine some aspects of a critique brought
forth by Claire Bishop in the February, 2006 edition of Artforum called, "The
Social Turn: Collaboration and its Discontents”. Bishop writes about the recent
gravitation towards “collectivity” and collaboration. She claims they have had
a tepid reception from the “normal” commercial art world due to the difficulty
in marketing it.
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| Claire Bishop |
Though she
seems to at least acknowledge that these new relational forms “rehumanizes” a
society left in the repetitive trance of capitalist industrial models. She
claims that those who tout the altruistic motives of relational aesthetic forms
believe they are exempt from critique and that there be no boring,
uninspiring relational art because of its contribution to the strengthening and
re-invigoration of social bonds. The relational aesthetic advocates claim that
were they held to the same hierarchical standards of the past we may be left
with the same stale and irrelevant art forms of that past (painting and sculpture). Bishop states that
in light of a kind of impasse between advocates of traditional modes of
critique and those in support of the more socially participatory forms a mode of critique
has emerged (kind of). This mode is more about process. Meaning how an artist goes about
staging and framing a relational encounter. The means in this respect outweighs
the end. As I read this article I have been attempting to apply this same logic
to the early twentieth century measures of critique. How would one critique
Duchamp’s fountain had they even accepted Duchamp’s theoretical approach (destroy the old)? Better yet what about those who questioned the flatness of the Earth? Bishop goes on regarding the emergence of an adequate model for equivocal
critique; “it has been quite
disheartening to read the criticism of other artists that also arises in the
name of this equation: Accusations of mastery and egocentrism are leveled at
artists who work with participants to realize a project instead of allowing it
to emerge through consensual collaboration.” This seems to be where it all gets
a little tricky. The collaborative artists renunciation of any authoritarian
construction from which an activity can gain aesthetic weight is countered with
their good intentions. I’m wondering if this is getting to be more of a
semantic discussion (what defines art?) or if a culture NEEDS high critical
standards. I mean if a relational work is stripped of all aesthetic potential,
is it ripe for criticism, or do we all sing kumbaya? Bishop finally gives a
conclusion worth the wait. She refers to what contemporary French philosopher Jacques Rancierre wrote regarding
this conundrum. He seems to
suggest that it is the tension and confusion between aesthetic discourse and
the desire for progressive social prerogatives that mediate our more delicate
social conundrums. Rancierre writes; "the ability to think contradiction: the
productive contradiction of art’s relationship to social change, characterized
by that tension between faith in art’s autonomy and belief in art as
inextricably bound to the promise of a better world to come." Wow, am I blogging
about Nicolas Bourriaud or Stephen Duncombe!
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