Second session of art theory.

Installation - Class Notes

• Is this installation art? To answer this question you can ask yourself, are all my senses used?
• The viewer and object are nebulous in installation art as they both effect each other to create meaning.
• It argues you can be anywhere to view it.
• engages the viewer in everyday life and politics
• Merzhou, constantly changing, like active documentation, need to take photos or only in the memory
• context, the 1930's in Germany there was a changning political situation so Merzhou was the artist's alternative reality
• the web installation, makes the other artwork more difficult to see. Why ould he do this to his fellow compatriot artists?
• art as process... Kaprow, so art can be something that changes, or an event something changed by the audience, they have cretive involvment
• minimalism, the space the object is in is just as important, (it is like 3D composition) 
• the meaning comes after being viewed...
• creating a dialogue about issues e.g. feminism
• Subverting the male gaze: for many years women had been painted looking away from the viewer. Valie Export she would look at the man touching her breast, she wore a box with a curtain at the front. What were the men's reactions? Some were disconcerted they couldn't look at her breasts as well. How did it affect her psyche? Maybe she should of shown up the men who painted women looking away by painting just as good, but the women is looking at you. Not by prostituting herself to strangers for art sake as a public statement or social experiment. Did she do this to meet people who wouldn't necessarily visit a gallery?
• Did she do this for empowerment to say "this is my body?" her eyes would have more feeling seen in real life than what could be possible in a painting? I think a clever artist could capture the right feeling in the eyes. Capturing that could be more powerful.
• Expanding the definition of fine art - women artists who don't have a strong art history presence as the makers anyway were now pushing the boundaries.
• semiotics of the kitchen is a video showing a young girl showing what kitchen utensils do in make believe, going through the alphabet. Very jerky movements, she just names the objects as if she is a tape recorder teacher.
• Why did she do this? The context is 1975, you don't have many cooking shows on tv. This is the domain of the woman, she is quite aggressive in her movements, giving her commentary on women's roles. Nowadays women chefs are sexualised on t.v., e.g. Nigella
• concern with the viewer's presence...
• In our modern age, is the best art, the art that comes to you,? You don't go to the gallery to see it?
• Amelia Jones
• What is thing theory?
• What is immaterial theory?

Homework: write about and react to one feminist exhibition from three time periods Amelia Jones talks about in her lecture. (Watch on VIMEO). Summarise the key points.

(Look up the powerpoint for notes).