Introduction to Art Making: Motion and Time
Based:
A question of the body and its reflections as gesture.
VIS 2
Tues: 6:30 p.m. to 8:20 p.m.
CENTER 115
Professor: Ricardo Dominguez
Email: rrdominguez@ucsd.edu
Office Hour: Wed. 4 to 5 p.m.
Art as gesture has almost always been anchored to the body, the
body in time, the body in space and the leftovers of body. The
body has a long history as a site of aesthetic experimentation
and reflection. This class will focus on the history of these
bodies in performance art. An additional objective for the course
will be a focus on the question of documentation of technologies
in order to understand their relationship to performance as an
active reflection.
We will look at modernist, contemporary and post-contemporary,
contemporary work by Chris Burden, Ulay and Abramovic, Allen
Kaprow, Vito Acconci, Coco Fusco, Faith Wilding, Anne Hamilton,
William Pope L., Tehching Hsieh, Revered Billy, Nao Bustamante,
Ana Mendieta, Cindy Sherman, Adrian Piper, Sophie Calle, Patty
Chang, James Luna, Surveillance Camera Players and the work of
many other performance artists.
Students will develop 1 performance action a week, for 5 weeks,
for a total of 5 actions (during the first part of the class),
individually or in collaboration with other students. The class
will view and discuss each students performance documentation
with the specific Teaching Assistant Block they are assigned to
for the quarter. Students will also be expected to Write an 8
page Final Paper (*MLA - Manuel of Style*) on a performance
artist, performance art, or the performance genre. The paper
should compare and contrast the above with your own gestures.
Course Requirements:
1) 5 performance gestures (10% each): You will be required to
construct a performance gesture and document the gesture. All
gestures will be done beyond UCSD and La Jolla, CA.
2) Final Paper (8 Pages) (30%): In the Final Paper students will
frame the work they have made in class by comparing and
contrasting it with the work of Performance Artist, theme or
genre covered in class. (MLA).
FINAL PAPER DUE MARCH 17th, 2008
3) *Students who have to miss any classes due to an emergency
(with documentation) will be able to take a cumulative make-up
exam during the last week of classes (dead week). Note that
social events such as weddings, anniversaries, quinceaneras or
barmitzvahs, though important, are not considered
emergencies.
4) Attendance and participation (20%): TA's will be taking
attendance every time our class meets. Aside from counting toward
your overall grade, attendance and participation will be crucial.
Students who do not show up to class and are unaware of the
material and discussions covered in lecture are not likely to
obtain a passing grade.
Course Website:
http://www.thing.net/~rdom/ucsd/performance3.html
This website is a crucial component of this course. The site will
include the syllabus and links for review. I strongly urge you to
review the Class Site on a weekly basis.
Grading Scale:
100-97 = A+
96-93 = A
92-90 = A-
89-87 = B+
86-93 = B
82-80 = B-
79-77 = C+
76-73 = C
72-70 = C-
69-67 = D+
66-63 = D
62-60 = D-
59 and below = F
ASSESSMENT CRITERIA
PERFORMANCES
Commitment/Risk
Creativity in Presentation
A General Understanding of Performance Art/Art History
Application of Critical Connections in each of your
performances
REQUIRED TEXT
Buy This Text for Class (Get it! and read it!)
Performance Art from Futurism to the Present, Roselee
Goldberg
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0500203393/ref=pd_bxgy_img_b/102-4818180-4832106?%5Fencoding=UTF8
Or At
http://www.powells.com/s?kw=+Performance+Art+from+Futurism+to+the+Present&x=0&y=0</u>
UCSD GROUNDWORKS BOOKSTORE OR UCSD BOOKSTORE
CATALOGUES AND BOOKS THAT ARE RECOMMENDED:
CATALOGUES:
Performa - New Visual Art Performance by RoseLee Goldberg
Art and Performance: Live (TATE U.K)
Out of Actions (LA MoCA)
Outside the Frame: Performance and the Object (Cleveland Center
for Contemporary Art)
Performance Art (edited by Roselee Goldberg)
Body and the East: Form the 60s to the Present, (Museum of Modern
Art, Ljubljana, Slovenia)
BOOKS:
Ethno-Techno; Writings on Performance, Activism and Pedagogy, G.
Gomez-Pena
The Twentieth Century Performance Reader, eds. Michael Huley and
Noel Witts
Performance, Marvin Carlson
Contract with the Skin, Kathy Odell
Performing the Body, Amelia Jones
The Explicit Body of Performance, Rebecca Schneider
Happenings and Other Arts, ed Mary Ellen Sandford
Unmarked, Peggy Phelan
Acting Act: Feminist Performances, eds. Lynda Hart and Peggy
Phelan
Letπs Get it On: The Politics of Black Performance,
ed. Catherine Ugwu
Corpus Delecti: Performance Art of the Americas, ed. Coco
Fusco
Greenwich Village 1963, Sally Banes
The Blurring of Art and Life, Alan Kaprow
Imaging Her Erotics, Carolee Schneeman
The Citizen Artist: An Anthology from High Performance
Magazine
Liveness, Philip Auslander
Dada Performance, ed. Mel Gordon
Futurist Performance, eds. Michael Kirby,
CLASS ONE
Jan 9th - Introduction to the Class: (The W(hole) Body) and its
Rituals
Opening discussion on the nature of the class, what will be
expected from each of you and the grading process? Explanation of
contexts for presentation and documentation of your 5
Gestures.
Gesture One:
Choose a site where you can engage in a performance activity for
at least 2 continuous hours. You can move for this exercise or be
still. If you move, donπt leave the site you have
chosen. Choose and develop a means of recording your
actions/inaction AND the events or non-eventfulness around you.
Try to be as aware as possible of the smallest of changes in your
own body, mind and immediate environment. Do not just wait for
something really noticeable to happen. Do not use any cameras or
electronic recording devices. Limit yourself to what you can
commit to memory, write down or otherwise record with some part
of your body. Once you have completed your action, chronicle the
experience in writing if you have not already written it down.
Keep in mind that while writing is PERMITTED, it is not the ONLY
way to make a record of actions, so consider other means too!
BRING DOCUMENTATION TO CLASS. Each TA Block will review and
discuss everyoneπs performance and non-traditional
documentation.
CLASS TWO:
Jan 16th - Gestures in Public Space and Time
Read:
Theory of the Derive
Guy Debord
http://www.ubu.com/papers/debord_derive.html
Teching Hsieh One Year Performance 1980 - 1981 (Time
Piece)
http://www.medienkunstnetz.de/works/one-year-performance/video/1/
Suzanne Lacy
http://www.suzannelacy.com/
Coco Fusco
http://www.cocofusco.com/
Notes on crawling piece - William Pope L.
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0425/is_n4_v56/ai_20544728
Rev. Billy
http://www.revbilly.com/
Yesmen
http://www.theyesmen.org/
Gesture Two:
Using any type of camera, to record only segments of your body
doing the same performance you did last week.
CLASS THREE:
Jan 23rd - Ephemeral Gestures
Ground Breaker
Ana Mendieta
http://www.offoffoff.com/art/2004/anamendieta.php
Lick and Lather
http://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/antoni/clip2.html
Loving Care
http://digitalconsciousness.com/artists/JanineAntoni/
Chiharu Shiota
http://archiv.hkw.de/deutsch/kultur/2001/translated_acts/shiota.html
Gesture
http://www.dianathompson.net/Gesture/g1.html
Gesture Three:
Using any type of camera record a performance of your making
something.
Many performances involve making, from concrete objects to
ephemeral or immaterial things, to traces of actions, to records
of actions, to waste products resulting from actions. Choose one
of these approaches and develop a performance that is organized
around the act of making.
BRING DOCUMENTATION TO CLASS. Each TA Block will review and
discuss everyones work.
CLASS FOUR:
Jan 30 - Photographs as Gestures, Gestures for Photographs
Some Thoughts on the Work of Hannah Wilke
http://blogs.warwick.ac.uk/zoebrigley/entry/deconstructing_the_feminine/
Mariko Mori - images
Nikki S. Lee - images
http://www.tonkonow.com/lee.html
Nikki S. Lee - Essay and images
http://www.mocp.org/collections/permanent/lee_nikki_s.php
ALICIA KURI
http://hemi.nyu.edu/gallery/exhibit2_eng/alicia_statement.html
Gesture Four:
Most of the history of performance actually is known through
photographs. Many performance artists rejected the use of
photographic documentation in the 50s and 60s, and also
elaborated a critique of the objectification of performance
through photography. On the other hand, many artists create
performances exclusively for the camera. For this session, you
should choose to create one of two kinds of performance: either a
performance that incorporates the process of photographing the
artist into the act itself (other students can act as
photographers) or a performance that is presented as a photograph
or series of photographs.
CLASS FIVE
February 6th - Naked Gestures
Carolee Schneemann
http://www.caroleeschneemann.com/
franko.b
http://www.franko-b.com/gallery/g_performance.htm
Liminal Spaces Within The Transgressive Body
by Colleen Walker, U.C. 2004
http://www.franko-b.com/text/cw_introduction.htm
Vanessa Beecroft
http://www.thing.net/~vanessa/screen.html
http://www.vanessabeecroft.com/
Gesture Five:
For this session use any type of camera to create a performance
of your
naked self. Use the camera as a confession machine or as a
disciplinary
machine. You could tell us secrets, show us your tattoos or sit
naked eating lunch. Just be naked! Which does not mean that you
have to be nude. One can be over dressed and still completely
naked and raw.
BRING DOCUMENTATION TO CLASS. Each TA Block will review and
discuss everyoneπs effort.
CLASS SIX
February 13th - NO CLASS - Gender Gestures
Judy Chicago
http://www.judychicago.com/
Guerrilla Girls
http://www.guerrillagirls.com/
Nao Bustamente
http://www.naobustamante.com/
Digital Drag Kings
http://www.technodyke.com/drag/default.asp
START TO DRAFT FINAL PAPER (MLA).
PRESENT ONE PAGE ON WHAT YOU WOULD LIKE TO COVER IN YOUR PAPER TO
YOUR TA BLOCK.
CLASS SEVEN
February 20th - Queer Gestures
Tim Miller
http://feastoffools.net/archives/2005/07/fof_121_-_tim_m.php
Tim Miller
http://hometown.aol.com/millertale/timmiller.html
Dyke Action Machine
http://www.dykeactionmachine.com/
Critical Regionalism: Mexico's Performative Range-of-Motion in
Madre por un dÌa & the RodrÌguez/Felipe
Wedding. by Amy Sara Carroll
http://hemi.nyu.edu/journal/2_2/carroll.html
CONTINUE TO READINGS
CLASS EIGHT
February 27th - Erotic Gestures
Valie Export
Tap and Touch cinema
http://www.medienkunstnetz.de/works/tapp-und-tastkino/video/1/
Frank Moore
http://www.eroplay.com
Annie Sprinkle
http://www.bobsart.org/sprinkle
CONTINUE TO READINGS
CLASS NINE
March 5 - The body and the question of pain
Subjective Made Object: Pain in Contemporary Art
Colin Fernandes, MD
http://www.ampainsoc.org/pub/bulletin/jul04/path1.htm
Bob Flanagan - includes a 1994 interview
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0268/is_n8_v34/ai_18387597
Bob Flanagan
http://www.suspectthoughts.com/flanagan.html
Pain Journals
Bob Flanagan Pain Journal
Ron Athey
http://www.ronathey.com/
Ron Athey's Artful Crown of Thorns
by C. Carr
December 9 - 15, 1998
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/9850,carr,2061,4.html
FINISH YOUR READINGS
SHOULD ALREADY BE WRITING YOUR PAPER
CLASS TEN
March 12 - Techno_Distributed Gestures
L
Lygia Clark and Helio Oiticica:
A Legacy of Interactivity and Participation
for a Telematic Future
http://www.leonardo.info/isast/spec.projects/osthoff/osthoff.html
Lygia Clark
Images
I know of no other artist
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0268/is_5_37/ai_53590127
Stelarc
http://www.stelarc.va.com.au/
Orlan
http://www.orlan.net/
Life_sharing
http://www.0100101110101101.org/home/life_sharing/index.html
FINAL PAPER DUE MARCH 17th,
2008
MORE ON-LINE DOCUMENTATION OF PERFORMANCE ART
Linda Montano
http://www.bobsart.org/montano/
Translated Acts: Performance Art from East
Asia
http://archiv.hkw.de/translated_acts.html
Media Art Net
http://www.medienkunstnetz.de/mediaartnet/
The Practice of Everyday Life
Michel de Certeau
http://www.ubu.com/papers/de_certeau.html
Art and Advocacy
http://www.inmotionmagazine.com/sl1.html
e-misferia (Latin American Performance and
Politics)
http://hemi.nyu.edu/journal/2_2/splash.html
Art and Commitment
http://artandcommitment.umn.edu/webstream.html
New Visual Art Performance
http://performa-arts.org/not-for-sale/interviews