Julia

Hi, my name is Julia! I’m a second-year studio art major with a minor in English. I started in the Bachelor of Arts general program last year and decided to declare my major in studio art after falling in love with the program. However, by the end of high school, I was pretty certain that I wanted to do something with studio art, but it wasn’t until a few months in that I realized that this was what I wanted to do. My goal from this is to become a high school teacher and be able to express my love of art to other people ( and hopefully inspire them as well).

Documentary – “The Artist is Present” By Marina Abramovic

Questions:

1. What are some of your first impressions of Marina Abramovic’s performance works, based on the documentary? Use an image/example of one or two works to describe aspects you admire, and aspects you might agree are problematic.

My first impression of her work was that it was very intense. As much as I love art, I cannot even think about sacrificing my entire life for it. For that, I admire her strength, perseverance, patience, and confidence that she brings to all her work. However, I do agree that various aspects of her work are controversial. For example, both images ( and most of her pieces) in a way risk her health, and there comes a point where you wonder if it is worth it to risk your life for the sake of performance, potentially. Along with everyone who is included in her performances as well.

1. What have you learned about the features of performance art based on Abramovic’s work? Name a few key features according to her examples. Include an image to illustrate. Consider her quote, “When you perform, it is like a knife and your blood, when you act, it is like a fake knife and ketchup.”

I learned how interactive and personal performance art is based on watching the documentary. For example, the importance of actions in relation to presence and time. I feel like that quote represents how she is performing reality, opposed to illusion, which is then part of the way she uses art to convey emotion, I think. Having the realistic element to it makes people think more about it and feel more.

Performance art resists many typical art world conventions in multiple ways. I feel like one of the main aspects of performance art that challenges this is the fact that performance is not a physical object; without video, there’s no record of it. Performance art becomes a moment, not a piece. Abramovic negotiates these challenges by performing in a way that creates an impact/ reaction, maybe? Her interactions with her audience, for example, create an impact both on the audience and whoever participates, making it memorable. Which, in this case, can become more of an artwork, or just as much as a typical, conventional artwork found in museums.

Km Assignment – Mind Exercise

For this project, I wanted to compare walking to typing to emphasize the automatic process that both hold and how they are a part of our daily lives.

To do this, I walked a Km, which ended up taking me 10:50 minutes, and I then typed for the same amount of time.

I find that when I write, I often reach a state of mind where I can type without thinking about it (when I have a good idea, when I have to do a repetitive task, etc.), and I reach a point where I can just keep typing. Another example could be typing out notes in class, I find that often I’m typing but not really retaining anything I’m writing down.

Which could be seen as just as much an exercise as walking in a way (and could often be just as productive, just mentally, instead of physically).

During this time, to emphasize my point about being able to reach this robot-like state of typing, I decided to write my stream of consciousness: