BE THE WORK

Intersubjectivity in Tino Sehgal´s This objective of that object

Elizabeth Carpenter
Abstract: For more than a decade, Tino Sehgal has placed direct experience at the center of his
practice through a series open-ended, undocumented, performative works called “constructed
siatuations”. Curador Elizabeth Carpenter elaborates on his piece THIS OBJECTIVE OF THAT
OBJECT (2004), as well as the broader implications of social interaction as an artistic medium
under capitalism. “While a sculptor may transform Stone into a human figure”, she writes,
“Sehgal transforms an individual´s energy intellect, and actions into something altogether
different, a new paradigm in art-making”.

CITATION: Carpenter, Elizabth. “Be the work: Intersubjectivity in Tino Sehgal´s This objective of
that object” In On Performativity, edited by Elizabeth Carpenter. Vol.1 of Living Collections
Catalogue. Minneapolis: Walker Art Center, 2014.

http://walkerdart.org/collections/publications/performativity/be-the-work.Walker Art
Center©2014.

Tino Sehgal does not create objects but rather experiences. Instead of exhibiting inanimate
artworks, he produces choreographed yet open-ended and renewable human interactions that
may be bought and sold, similar to any such product resulting from artistic labor.
Conceptualism, capitalism, and memory are at the heart of his practice, which has both
radically transformed the parameters of artistic production as we know it and expanded our
understanding of the “dematerialization of the object” in the twenty-first century. Through the
creation and exhibition of what he calls “constructed situations,” Sehgal proposes that the art
museum, for centuries driven by the collection and perpetuation of ideated materiality in all its
forms, has become a forum where the politics of social interaction and environmental
sustainability are played out in unexpected ways via performative art forms such as dance,
song, and the spoken word. While a sculptor may transform stone into a human figure, Sehgal
transforms an individual’s energy, intellect, and actions into something altogether different, a
new paradigm in art-making.

Sehgal studied dance and political economics in Berlin and Essen, Germany, at the Folkwang
Hochschule, before launching his dance career with French experimental choreographers
Jérôme Bel and Xavier Le Roy. In 1999, Sehgal joined Les Ballets C. de la B., a Berlin-based
dance collective, while continuing to independently develop and perform his own
choreography. His earliest cross-disciplinary work, Twenty Minutes for the Twentieth Century
(2000), a harbinger of the concerns the artist would explore in his later works in relation to the
immateriality of performance and the museum, was presented in 2001 in the exhibition I’ll
Never Let You Go, organized by the Moderna Museet in Stockholm, Sweden. Sehgal’s
interpretations of the dance aesthetics of twenty of the greatest choreographers of the
modern era, including Pina Bausch, Trisha Brown, Merce Cunningham, Isadora Duncan, Martha
Graham, Yvonne Rainer, and Le Roy, represented for the artist a transformation from his past
experience in choreographing a single, discrete piece into what might be understood as a
conceptual artwork-exhibition of collected performances—in his words, “a museum of dance”
incarnate.
Absolutely essential to the self-reflexive doctrine that drives Sehgal’s practice is a rigorous,
personal, and decidedly political belief system borne out of the impact that economic theory
and environmental activism have had on his thinking.

In 2000, with an exhibition at the Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst (SMAK) in Ghent,
Belgium, Sehgal found himself swiftly transitioning from a promising career as a
dancer/choreographer to work that more directly traded on the histories and practices of the
visual arts and its discourses on conceptualism, without having to abandon his belief in the
communicative, even expressive, capability of the material body as a carrier of meaning. The
exhibition included a single piece that the artist insisted appear on view during museum hours
for one week—hardly an unusual request, save for the fact that the work required the
continuous presence of human beings, whose physical needs for nourishment and rest
necessitated a schedule of shifts. With this work also came an artistic epiphany that was
shared with his audiences: what he had created was a work of art much like a sculpture, but
quite unlike an ephemeral in-gallery theatrical or dance piece. Sehgal soon gained the
attention of the art world with his work’s appearance in “Utopia Station” at the Venice
Biennale in 2003; solo exhibitions at the Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, and the Musée des
Beaux-Arts de Nantes, France, in 2004; and the German pavilion at the Venice Biennale in
2005.

Absolutely essential to the self-reflexive doctrine that drives Sehgal’s practice is a rigorous,
personal, and decidedly political belief system borne out of the impact that economic theory
and environmental activism have had on his thinking. Unconcerned with the vast differences
between the theory and praxis of economics, dance, and the visual arts, Sehgal broke down
the walls between these disciplines as he questioned ways that systems of production and
distribution might operate within culture as well as commerce.

The artist does not find fault in capitalism per se, but rather critiques the material basis for the
production side of the market economy:

“What interests me … is how a product was produced. In most cases, the process has involved
someone taking natural resources from the earth and then someone else coming around and
transforming these natural resources into a production by some form of labor. This structure is
shared by the production process of most things and products in our society. … This mode of
production by the transformation of material has been highly efficient: now for the first time in
human history, there are societies where basic needs are adequately covered and the
immediate dangers of nature have been tamed. But now this mode of production is also
becoming problematic: firstly since it is beginning to become counterproductive due to
hazardous emissions or to resources becoming scarce. … So the question is whether there is a
different way of producing (and thereby generating income) that would be less
counterproductive and that would also be of more interest to us.”

The artist postulates that it is possible to create art in a way that will not negatively impact the
environment, produced through nothing more than the expenditure of human energy and
exchanged sustainably in a free market system. Ultimately, what he strives for is the
“simultaneity of production and deproduction, instead of the economics of growth,” a practice
in which the work is produced but at the end of the day is deproduced, in that it no longer
takes up physical but rather memory space.
As he set about building the cycle of production, distribution, and consumption into his art
early on, Sehgal struggled to communicate his imperative that the work not stand apart from
or in opposition to the customary operations of art-world and economic systems, especially in
regard to consumption—a maxim that proved to be most challenging to the art-world status
quo and for his critics to reconcile. He argued that in order for the artist to support himself,
and in so doing continue to participate in the market economy just like any other working
person, the output of his labor (the artwork, his product) had to be purchased and provide
income both to the artist and to those in his employ.

Not content to leave the conversation there, he extended his argument to describe our current
moment not as “an age of production of things,” but rather one of the “production of
subjectivity.” He explained, “As people have to make an income they are constantly trying to
think—consciously or not—what do other people have a demand for and how can we produce
something for this demand? … Because what we have demand for, as an affluent society or as
the rich peoples that we are in the West, is a differentiation of our personality or a demand for
differentiation of our subjectivity.” Here Sehgal imagines a time in the future in which needs
are met and wants are satisfied not necessarily by the exchange of objects but by
interpersonal exchange, one that aids us in defining for ourselves and for others, our
personality (our character, behavior, emotions, attitudes), and ultimately our subjectivity (who
we are). The individual will trump the material; our coffers will overflow with “an inter-
subjective wealth.”

To date, Sehgal has created what might be roughly broken down into at least four bodies of
work. The first group of works is composed from carefully choreographed movements, and as
such, are more akin to dance. A number of these reference various artists and artworks from
art history, such as Instead of allowing something to rise up to your face dancing bruce and
dan and other things (2000), which quotes body movements from pieces such as Bruce
Nauman’s Wall-Floor Positions (1968) and Dan Graham’s Roll (1970) and Kiss (2004), in which
great embraces from the history of art are enacted by two interpreters on the gallery floor;
and This variation (2012), in which vocalizations, singing, and sound break through a pitch-
black gallery where the aural takes precedence over the formal or discursive. Unlike his more
conversational pieces, such as This objective of that object (2004), the works in this first
category take a more traditional approach to the relationship of the audience to a static work
of art—the visitor has the option to gaze passively upon the interpreters or to simply listen, as
in the case of This variation. Here interaction is neither necessary nor invited. According to the
artist, with these pieces he “was trying to fulfill all conventions to make my work comparable
to a traditional sculpture. … From there on, I just wanted to become more specific to my own
medium. I have people enacting my work and they can become much more than just a solid
material can. … I create situations which use the capacities of these people, and make them
increasingly more complex.” For Sehgal, the molding and modeling of his corporeal material in
this first category is a meditation on animate form rather than subjectivity, which is a key
concern in other works.

The second group of works is more declarative in nature. Instead of the visitor taking in a form,
they take in a message. Falling within this category are pieces such as This is propaganda
(2002), in which museum guards sing “This is propaganda, you know, you know,” and then
state the artist’s name, title of the piece, and the date; This is new (2003), for which a museum
staff member approaches a visitor and reads a newspaper headline from that day; and perhaps
his most humorous work, This is contemporary (2004), for which a museum guard dances and
sings “This is so contemporary, contemporary, contemporary!” when a visitor enters the
space.

There is a marked escalation of scale, complexity, and ambition in these works. Rather than
occupying the same amount of space as a single life-size figure on a pedestal, the entire gallery
becomes a site for congregation, epiphany, and exchange—one of productivity rather than
contemplation.

The final category includes This is exchange (2002), in which visitors are offered money to
converse about the market economy; This is progress (2010), in which visitors amble while in a
conversation with four interpreters of varying ages on the nature of “progress”; and These
associations (2012), in which concepts of individualism and group behavior occupy seventy
interpreters who share personal anecdotes with members of the public. Each of these pieces
amply reveals Sehgal’s acuity in distilling the spoken word, natural and choreographed
movement, game strategies, institutional behavior, and social norms in a single piece. There is
a marked escalation of scale, complexity, and ambition in these works. Rather than occupying
the same amount of space as a single life-size figure on a pedestal (such as two entwined
bodies kissing), the entire gallery becomes a site for congregation, epiphany, and exchange—
one of productivity rather than contemplation.

This objective of that object, which belongs to the latter group, centers on the agency of the
visitor in the face of an unorthodox and decidedly oblique invitation from complete strangers
to participate in a work of live art. The piece takes place in an empty gallery, devoid of any
other artwork. The space, the dimensions of which must enable the interpreters and visitors to
move freely, is activated when a visitor enters the room. With their backs turned toward the
visitor and without making eye contact throughout the situation, the five interpreters breathe
deeply while moving into a loose circle formation around the visitor. They begin to chant, at
first almost inaudibly and then rising to a crescendo, until the following sentence is plainly
heard: “The objective of this work is to be the object of a discussion.” Unless the visitor reacts
to this provocation, the interpreters whisper their refrain one last time, then melodramatically
fall facedown onto the floor, as if expiring in unison. This marks the end of the situation. If the
visitor does in fact respond with a question or a statement, the interpreters stand up and
energetically proclaim, “We have a comment! We have a comment!” They then ask, “Who will
answer? Who will answer?” to which one will respond, “I will.” If they have heard any of the
responses before, an interpreter will add, “It is a question that we have heard before!” The
discussion ensues as they evaluate and analyze the visitor’s comment(s) or speak about what
they have heard in a manner similar to the way an art critic would discuss or critique an
artwork. The interpreters also have the option of speculating on the cultural attitude informing
the comment. At any point, one of the interpreters may put an end to the discussion with a
drawn-out articulation, “So …,” to activate a chain of eight words, each spoken by a different
interpreter: “So-no-more-comments, so-no-more-questions.” With this, all interpreters but
one lean back and spin out of the room. The interpreter who remains is then available to
answer the visitor’s additional questions in a more candid fashion and, if asked, may reveal the
name of the artist, the title of the piece, and the year the work was created. If at any moment
as the piece unfolds another visitor enters the gallery, the current conversation abruptly ends
and the process begins anew.
Sehgal gives his interpreters a fairly wide berth for the types of free responses they may offer,
while also leaving it up to their discretion to speak with or about the visitor; but with either
option, the artist directs them to be forceful (even aggressive) in their communications.
Dorothea von Hantelmann has also observed that “although visitors are able to influence the
course of the discussion by contributing to what is being said or interjecting a comment, they
nonetheless never attain a position equal to that of the players, in part because of the formal
arrangement of the situation.”

The experience of this piece is unlike any other work in the Walker’s collection. From the
outset, there is likely to be unparalleled unfamiliarity on the part of the visitor with the
mechanics of what is happening as well as uncertainty regarding “the objective” of the work
and who holds the keys to unlock its meaning. Perhaps it is the assertive staging (interpreters
facing the walls, not the visitor) in addition to the choreographed movement and vocalization
(breathing, chanting, collapsing) that readily communicates a mediated and premeditated
experience rather than genuine repartee. Never is there a complete normalization of the
exchange. Although this realization may bring about discomfort, self-consciousness, and even
alienation, these same feelings may also breed meaningful exchanges of ideas. This is not so
much of an encounter with a work of art as a commitment to become the work. It boils down
to the question of will—you are “hailed” by the work, but are you willing to respond to it and
in so doing become its object and subject? The performance of subjectivity is also played out in
the grammar of Sehgal’s titles and the scripted statements embedded in his works. For
instance, many of his titles begin with the phrase “This is.” Von Hantelmann has accounted for
this as “a kind of mimetic trick to communicate the situation and transport the questions of
content and meaning into the here and now. They emphasize this situation, place value on
what happens at this very moment, in precisely this intersubjective relationship.”

Much has been written about Sehgal’s rigid strictures against any and all forms of
documentation, including written agreements or certificates of authenticity, photographs,
videos, sound recordings, scripts, transcriptions, wall labels, catalogues, and even press
releases. What could possibly be the reasoning behind this embargo? Again, the artist stays
true to his mandate that no material transformation (from tree to paper) or consumption of
natural resources take place in the production of the work and concomitant exhibition. In
addition, he makes intrinsic to his process the disposition of stopgap measures in order to
prevent ephemera related to his work from accruing monetary value. He points to the Fluxus
movement as an example to make this point regarding the feeding frenzy that has occurred
among collectors of primary documents, of which the Walker Art Center in this case is
unapologetically “guilty.” According to the artist, “Experience with movements like Fluxus
shows that documentation can easily become a kind of sacred relic, and that it is impossible to
control this process. Fluxus actions and happenings were aimed at the single, ephemeral,
auratic moment of their realization. … Therefore, they were dependent on documentation in
the end. My work, on the contrary, has the possibility built into it that it can be shown again
and again, even in 30 or 200 years. Therefore, this question of documentation is less virulent.”

Michel Guthier has provided still another accounting for what he calls Sehgal’s “grapho- and
icono-phobic protocol”:

“It marks the extension of the artwork’s mode of existence to the mechanism of its
socialization. Because the piece is performative by definition, so are the modalities of its
transmission, in both the aesthetic and business meanings of the word. Sehgal is rooted in a
time in the history of art when the artist can no longer ignore the fact that an artwork can
never be presented in society in the form of a naked and autonomous realization. It is
surrounded by a mechanism to complete and protect it by forcing upon the pubic, if not an
instruction manual and an interpretation, at least some kind of approach. Thus Sehgal does not
want documentation that is peripheral to the work to rob it of its performative character.”

Sehgal provides us with a given—that nothing ancillary will exist that can be bought and sold,
and for as long as the artist is alive, the essential work will be passed down from the artist (and
the artist’s chosen representatives) to generations of curators and collectors. In the short
history of the art world, this in itself is radical; but when put in the context of human history, it
is a mere blip—we have bequeathed histories, genealogies, laws, prayers, memories, and
rituals to our descendants, not to mention stories, dances, poems, and plays, since we have
had the powers of speech. Sehgal, too, is positioning us to inherit his fortune of well-wrought
ideas and actions via training, cognition, and memory. Memory is the only true recourse to
documentation through the oral recounting of experience; for example, the rules of the game
that brought about the actual events. Group memorization thus becomes the standard mode
of “conservation” of the work—one that insures its preservation, perpetuation, and
authenticity.

When it comes to each work in Sehgal’s oeuvre, memory is the ultimate tool in the
conservator’s toolkit—that “it exists in my mind, in my body and the bodies of the people who
know how to do it, and … in their memories and of those of the people who saw it” ensures its
preservation, which is one of the important roles of any collecting institution.

Sehgal is not troubled by the fact that oral transmission of information makes the work
extraordinarily vulnerable to the ravages of forgetfulness, inattention, and disagreement. To
the contrary, he finds the inevitable attrition of his original intent provocative as a gradual and
inevitable aging process that will continually reflect cultural shifts taking place in a given time
or place, a process of evolutionary renewal that is out of his control. According to Sehgal, there
will be a “continuous involvement of the present with the past in creating further presents
instead of an orientation toward eternity…” In other words, the artist anticipates that with
every installation of the piece, there will be a “new present” during which some kind of subtle
transformation of the work will take place (that will be internalized and perpetuated by its
custodians), which in turn will bring about what might be viewed as a generational standard
for what the piece is at any present moment. This standard jettisons the customary mandate
for preservation of the artist’s intent at the moment of creation as a way to keep
decomposition at bay. When it comes to each work in Sehgal’s oeuvre, memory is the ultimate
tool in the conservator’s toolkit—that “it exists in my mind, in my body and the bodies of the
people who know how to do it, and … in their memories and of those of the people who saw
it” ensures its preservation, which is one of the important roles of any collecting institution.

The Walker Art Center was the first institution to complete Sehgal’s promulgated system of
production and distribution through the purchase of This objective of that object. The formal
agreement of the terms of the oral contract of sale occurred on Friday, March 5, 2010, at
Marian Goodman Gallery in New York City. The artist, the gallerist, a notary, and I, along with
five other individuals representing the Walker and the gallery, were present to negotiate the
terms of the contract and act as witnesses to the events that unfolded over the course of
nearly two hours. After the perfunctory greetings and introductions, Sehgal began by
explaining the process. He would articulate five clauses dealing with the artist’s authorization
of the first installation at the Walker—the proper training, hiring, and pay of players whom he
also refers to as “interpreters”; the minimum time frame during which the piece would be on
view; the prohibition of photographic and any other means of documentation; and the
acceptance and perpetuation of the actions represented by these clauses, if the piece were to
be deaccessioned—after which he would invite questions, comments, and changes, one clause
at a time. After consensus was reached on the part of the artist and the representatives from
the Walker, Sehgal restated the clause and moved on to the next. This procedure was
repeated until all five clauses were discussed and agreed upon. The artist concluded the
meeting by ratifying each clause in succession, followed by official (and congratulatory)
handshakes around the table. What saves this process for veering into the absurd is Sehgal’s
seductive and uncompromising commitment to his own rules of engagement. It is the clarity of
his intent that entices and convinces one to play by these rules. The notion that Sehgal’s works
not only demand but also thrive on action is the signal importance behind his artistic
breakthrough. As the artist notes, “There’s no possibility not to act, so everything you do, even
if it doesn’t seem like acting, produces an effect.” The metaphorical power of this fundamental
statement in the current climate is not simplistic, nor is it utopian, but rather meant to stand
for the possibility of empowerment on the part of the museum and its visitor. Everyone who
participates in Sehgal’s work is expected to act and reflect—to act, reflect, and remember.
Elizabeth Carpenter is an independent curator and scholar. She came to the Walker from the
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, where she was on the curatorial team responsible for the
exhibition and catalogue Robert Rauschenberg: A Retrospective (1997). At the Walker she was
curator of visual arts and collections from 2001 to 2013. During her tenure she organized
numerous exhibitions, including Dance Works III: Merce Cunningham/Rei Kawakubo (2012),
Frank Gaard: Poison and Candy (2012), Robert Irwin: Slant/Light/Volume (2009), Hélio
Oiticica/Rirkrit Tiravanija: Contact (2010), and Frida Kahlo, which opened at the Walker in 2007
and traveled to the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.
She is currently a Walker adjunct curator working on an upcoming exhibition and catalogue
with artist Katharina Fritsch. Carpenter holds an MA in art history from the University of
Minnesota and an M.Phil. in art history from the City University of New York.

ENDNOTES

Lucy Lippard, Six Years: The Dematerialization of the Art Object from 1966 to 1972 (1973;
repr., Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997).↩

Arthur Lubow, “Making Art Out of an Encounter,” New York Times, January 17, 2010.↩

For additional biographical information, see Lubow, “Making Art Out of an Encounter.”↩

Curator Jens Hoffman can largely be credited for this as he was an early champion of Sehgal’s
work, inviting the artist to participate in the first Tirana Biennale at the National Gallery in
Tirana, Albania, in 2001 after having seen his piece at the Moderna Museet in 2001, and again
that year for the exhibition A Little Bit of History Repeated at Kunst-Werke, Berlin. In 2002,
Hoffman included Sehgal’s This is good (2001) in Manifesta 4. Four years later, they
collaborated on a solo exhibition at the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London, which
continued to build the artist’s reputation and catalyze criticism around his work. This objective
of that object was first presented in that show. In 2007, at the CCA Wattis Institute for
Contemporary Arts in San Francisco, Hoffman exhibited Sehgal’s oeuvre one piece at a time,
amounting to the artist’s first US retrospective exhibition.↩
Jörg Heiser, ed., Funky Lessons (Frankfurt am Main: Revolver, 2005), 103.↩

Dorothea von Hantelmann and Marjorie Jongbloed, I Promise It’s Political: Performativity in
Art (Cologne: Museum Ludwig, 2002), 91. ↩

Tino Sehgal interview with Maurizio Cattelan, “Tino Sehgal: Economics of Progress,” Flash Art
264 (January–February 2009): 90.↩

Markus Schinwald interview in Jessica Morgan and Catherine Wood, “It’s all true: The World as
a Stage II,” Tate Etc. 11 (Autumn 2007): 74.↩

Silvia Sgualdini, “The Objectives of the Object: An Interview with Tino Sehgal,” in e-cart.ro
Contemporary Art Magazine 6 (August 2005), accessed May 31, 2013, http://e-cart.ro/ec-
6/silvia/uk/g/silvia_uk.html.↩

Author in conversation with Yasmil Raymond, curator of record for This objective of that object
at the time the work was proposed to the Walker Art Center Board of Trustees for acquisition,
October 2008. According to Raymond, for this piece Sehgal requires in-depth training of his
interpreters, who are selected by audition prior to being hired in order to ensure they are
physically and intellectually up to the challenge of literally thinking on their feet for the
durational performance. The group of interpreters could include museum staff members,
gallery monitors, individuals with varied backgrounds, and people of various ages and body
types, but all must have the ability to generate thoughtful discussions on philosophy, political
science, or cultural studies.↩

Author in conversation with Yasmil Raymond, October 2008.↩

Sgualdini, “The Objectives of the Object,” http://e-cart.ro/ec-6/silvia/uk/g/silvia_uk.html.↩

Dorothea von Hantelmann, How to Do Things with Art: The Meaning of Art’s Performativity
(Zürich and Dijon: JRP|Ringier and Les presses du réel, 2012), 166.↩

Von Hantelmann has also addressed the subject of Sehgal’s dramaturgy and the fact that if the
visitors felt the gaze of the players, they “would be subjected to a completely different kind of
power.” See How to Do Things with Art, 167. ↩

See Louis Althusser’s theory of “interpellation” as discussed in Judith Butler, Bodies That
Matter: On the Discursive Limits of “Sex” (New York: Routledge, 1993).↩

Von Hantelmann, How to Do Things with Art, 162–163. She goes on to construct a short history
of the assertion “This is” in different contexts in the art of the twentieth century, including
such statements as “this [urinal] is art,” which accompanied Marcel Duchamp’s readymade
Fountain (1917/1964), and the phrase “Ceci n'est pas une pipe.” (This is not a pipe.) in René
Magritte’s painting The Treachery of Images (1929). Von Hantelmann concludes that Duchamp
and Sehgal share a concern “with showing, even exposing, the reality claim of their
statement.”↩

The Walker Art Center’s Fluxus collection, acquired in 1991, includes nearly 520 works. ↩

Funky Lessons, 105.↩

Michel Gauthier, “Tino Sehgal, Pour que se poursuivre la discussion/Tino Sehgal Keeps Us
Talking,” trans. L. S. Torgoff, Art Press 313 (June 2005): 44–45.↩
Tino Sehgal quoted in von Hantelmann, How to Do Things with Art, 156.↩

Ian Sutherland and Sophia Krzys Acord, “Thinking with Art: From Situated Knowledge to
Experiential Knowing,” Journal of Visual Art Practice 6, no. 2 (2007): 132.↩

The piece had already been approved for acquisition by the Walker Art Center’s Board of
Trustees at their meeting in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on October 20, 2008. Those present at
this landmark event also included Karina Daskalov, director, Marian Goodman Gallery;
Christelle Clement, notary public; and four representatives from the Walker Art Center: Susan
White, Walker trustee; Peter Eleey, curator, Visual Arts; Brooke Kellaway, Getty fellow; and
Camille Washington, Curatorial Fellow for Diversity in the Arts.↩

The final agreement, which I have transcribed from memory, is as follows:

Work must be installed by Tino Sehgal or other persons authorized by him.

The Walker Art Center will give the artist six months prior notice of exhibition opening.

For the first installation of the work, the Walker Art Center will hire as many interpreters as
possible (not necessarily Walker staff members), who will be trained and authorized as the
artist’s representatives in perpetuity. For the second and subsequent installations, the artist
and his representatives will be invited to install the piece or have the authority to empower
the local authorized representatives to train new interpreters, should that be necessary in
order to have all the all the shifts covered.

Work must be on display for no less than six weeks.

The Walker Art Center altered this clause to state that the work will be on display for a
minimum of four weeks, or less if the work appears in a group exhibition that is fewer than
four weeks in duration.

The Walker Art Center agrees that the work will be on view during all regular museum hours.

Interpreters must be paid.

The Walker Art Center agrees to pay interpreters $15 per hour minimum, effective
immediately, to be adjusted in the future against the consumer price index.

Photographic and video documentation are prohibited.

The Walker Art Center will not photograph the work and will not permit the press or visitors to
photograph the work.

The Walker Art Center agrees to employ all best efforts to prevent the production of any forms
of documentation of the work and to employ all best efforts to prevent distribution, if held
harmless by the artist and his representation for claims resulting from any failure to do so.

The Walker Art Center will not police the production and distribution of illicit images by a third
party, as artist shall be responsible for asserting his own artistic rights to such images.

Work must only be installed in an empty gallery—never outdoors, in a theater, on a stage, or

in the same space as other works of art.

Amendment: Deaccession and resale on the secondary market is approved by the artist, as
long as these five clauses are transferred and agreed upon by new owners.
Amendment: Jurisdiction of dispute resolution resides with the plaintiff.↩

Tino Sehgal quoted in Yasmil Raymond, Walker Art Center Acquisitions document, October
2008, Walker Art Center Archives.↩