Artificial Hells by Claire Bishop.

Chapter 2: The Historic Avant-Garde

In this chapter, Claire Bishop explores the contradictions and ambiguities of three early attempts at
involving the audience in artistic projects forerunners to what we today designate as socially-
engaged, public or participatory art: the Futurism movement in Italy in the beginning of the 20th
century, politically-oriented artistic initiatives connected to the Russian Revolution in 1917, as well
the Paris Dada. A common point within these projects is the way they used art to create new social
realities.

I have prepared some questions to guide you through the text and that we can discuss next week.
The text is long and the questions are many. I have therefore indicated the most relevant pages and
paragraphs for us.

I - Provocation, Press and Participation

p. 42/43
What did the Futurist serate consist of and how were they structured? Brief actions – unorganized
events varied media (restos!) futurist symphony, poetry, painting (in that order) conscious
dépassement des bornes. Commnication made before was here to stir up « got a bit of jizz in yor
face ? » provoke spectator to come. Stepping.
What was new about the way in which visual artworks were presented in these evenings? The artist
is presented ; paintings on stage. Alternative presentation : the artist's choice. Sometimes streets,
itinerant (histoire d soldat)

p.44/46
What was the target audience of Futurism and why were images important to convey the
movement’s ideology? For immediate idéel contact with subconscious – also theories of Bernays.
Occupation de l'espace et non division for service opportunities : fascism ?

In order to break with the passivity of spectators, Futurists adopted techniques from among others
Variety theatre, a theatrical form experienced as more audience-centric than traditional bourgeois
theatre. What were these techniques? Talk sing shout about the crowd itself, either as slurring, or
populist appraisal. Connect through contemplation of images and not interpretation of text. Time-
reduce of attention. Combat heraclitean value of conflict – love and hate in one Empedokles – only
union possible is to have the same struggle – the same enemy. Non-seqentiality of event and
subliminally making it educate the audience– surprise. Using audience as fuel

p.46-47
What other activities accompanied the Futurist serate? Public upheaval.

p.47-49
Describe the political project of Futurism. Make italy enter modern world of technocentrism,
war.Why was provocation useful for the movement and how did the audience react to it? What are
Bishop’s reservations against the use of provocation?

How can we understand the expression” a space for shared collective presence and self-
representation” in the context of Futurism? All is a stage, forced to participate car ns sommes visés
en tt qe public. Creating common identity through certain violence. Dénominateur commun Khôra.

II - Theatricalising life

p.50-53 (beginning)
In the years following the Russian Revolution there were many different viewpoints amongst
political leaders as to what role art was to take in the formation of a new Communist society. Could
you describe:  the position of Bogdanov and the way he thought art could “produce” social reality;
Lenin’s relationship to cultural heritage; Trotsky’s psychological understanding of art? B : cancel
old heritage and make artist worker, originality is not individual : genius at humus – art is
expression of one's participation to work and society, it is this participation ; SUSTAIN SOCIETAL
CHANGE THROUGH CULTURAL CHANGE revolutionary consciousness. to combine materials
in new way – eriger new systems pour la classe et non la spéculation ou la contemplation. Lenin
thought this project was not réalisable que le peuple la totalité est trop en retard, et que ce progrès
artistiqe ne sera qu'un détail. Il était Hegelien dans le sens de l'histoire en progrès en accumulation –
ne rien refuser. With shared originilaty, what is original anymore ? Trotsky veut réorganiser la vie
intérieure en la répliquant. Self education. Art is exploration of the world. Function specificied
given to art in anyway.

p.53-55
Shortly describe the strategies used by Meyerhold and Kerzhentsev in their theatre plays in order to
break hierarchies and effect social change. Audience « participation » throwing pamphlets.
Gesamtkunstwerk. Collective consciousness. Stop contemplation – start eauqlity – I could be that
person, I could be that ACTOR and what he goes through – indeed I am. « comme » du khôra dans
la scène. C'était chiant, mais le progrès promet tout ! Equality of art and collective and craft –
collective viewing ? No more individual expression

p.57-59
What was the purpose of the re-enactements and mass spectacles promoted by the Proletkult?
Before the revolution, simulation, after simulacrum – use of public space and not the prison of
stage. Réduire l'individu en face de la contemplation (! ça s'oppose!) du awesome -même stravinsky
a un peu de ça -. à cette époque, le socialisme est le nationalisme. Art would require this to be
separate from the world, to remain an illusion – but ideology wants to share the experience as
closely as can be. « improving the original event » through art and craft. ritualization

p.59
What do you understand by a “theatre of memory” and how can such an art form impact upon our
perception of history? Reactivate memory and great moments. Poetry to legitimize the upraising of
past and future.

p.63/65
Bishop describes two initiatives in the realm of music: conductorless orchestras and the “Hooter
symphonies”. What were, according to her, the pros and cons of each of them? Good idea
iedologically, but not ready aesthetically.

III- Excursions and trials

p.66 
How did Dada define itself as a collective? All negating
What united the artists in the group? Same struggles.

p.68-69
Why was the presence of art in public space important for the Dadaists (why take to the streets) and
how did they seek to change our usual perception of this space? Criticism of events involving public
space up to then = bluffing with the press – subvert established events:less provocative, more
goodwill.Aragon : que le dada n'empiète pas sur la morale des gens.
p.70 
Why did André Breton condemn the use of provocation and scandal in art? Because shock only
happens once, and also man's thirst for being provoked is unsaitable.
Provocation became empty because they were waiting for it.

Against interpretation by Susan Sontag

Part 1:

How do you understand the separation between the form and content of art as explained by Susan
Sontag? Focus on representation and mimetic « function » means a focus on the content, on what art
means, on what it represents, what represented being either inner our outer. Les modèles de l'art
n'existent pas moins – et ce n'est qu'avec les abstract expressionistes que la fonction de fenêtre
donné par l'art cesse, au profit d'une courbe indiquant des points de force et de l'information
(Rauschenberg). Forme est indépendante-dépendante (différente) du contenu. Les forces en jeu dans
le contenu doivent être servies par la forme, qui est la commodité, le code (Boulez) par lequel l'idée
sera exprimée. Formes et tropes.

Part 2: 
Explain shortly and in your words the relationship between content and interpretation. Why are they
interdependent, how does one sustain the other? Interpretation is solely focused on content : it's the
continuation of the hegemony of content of meaning over art. (Not the birth of the consciousness of
emanation of the real mystery, it being that it is visible rather than remaining a principle).
Interpretation is the habit of taking art seriously, epecting it to teach us ; I wouldn't come to art if I
weren't able to interpret it. I want to manipulate this.

Part 3:

What do you understand by “post-mythic consciousness”? What is our usual relationship to

symbols/the symbol? Symbols, after myths, mean something else (metaphor, allegory, parabole).
We want to find principles of meaning through different sources. Realism and logic (science) forced
to see myths and stories as something else in order to keep these alive. Thus, interpretation is a
means of CONSERVING texts even after their ideic existence seems to have vanished in favor of
their simple existence (Eco, the Library as model for knowledge). It's showing a meaning that
precedes even the creation of the text – it was there, (Pendule : who says that ? CA!). Recently,
interpretation is aggressive, against the phenomena of first degree of reading (lectio divinas) ; since
everything appearing is false, everything must be subsued, defined, penetrated.
Definition 1 : interp. C'est échapper au passé mort.
Def 2 : c'est tuer ce passé, le torturer.

Part 4 to 6:

How and why can interpretation be an impoverishment? Name concrete situations in which this
becomes apparent. Do you agree with this argument? Interpretation is duplication (Wben) of a text,
loss of uniqueness of what is readily (read:) )available.
A contretemps, avec l'incessant espoir de le tuer - et qui arrivent à le réduire - des
incapables de création se présentent et proposent l'analyse de l'oeuf . Henri Michaux
shouldn't it be irreductible ? In the case of literature, I find that knowing beforehand that a certain
work is hard to interpret, that you don't get it if you don't understand it immediately as something
other than it is, is not encouraging. Ulysses. Beethoven's 9th as incarnation of his carnal desires, of
presentation of his holocaustic urge to rape. To impose a meaning on the object.
Deleuze Leibniz : chacun a la totalité de l'infini de la ville en soi : chacun a une série variation
différente de cet infini. Cependant à l'intérieur de cette variation (qui dépend à la fois de soi et non),
nous avons une zone, un site, qui est le point de vue dilué, petit espace clair.

Part 7:

Sontag suggests that cinema restores the balance between form and content because of the way
cinematic techniques such as cutting and composition (montage) elude meaning-making. Could you
say the say of music and how? In cinema, evidence of what is shown – pure window – is also an
illusion, even though it closes down (the spectacle does) the idea of interpretation in favor of that of
awe (soviets' reenactments). Techniques of ellipse, moment-form, show that the process of
formation is the meaning itself. The jump, the movement of an otherwise empty resonance shows
the new paradigm of music : as sets of coordinates, of information, not of representation (the
surface, when immobile, stops). These new techniques of form stops also interprets from moving
astray. Exactitude provudes truth instead of projection.

Part 8 to10:

What does Sontag understand by an “erotics of art”?

Description in art in the making rather than order. Ordonnance et ordre cependant vont ensemble.
The set of information in its making (speaking specifically in music) blends two categories. For
example :
Nono, Diotima-quartet.
Lachenmann, pression : both description of the feeling to attain and prescrption to attain it. You
have to attain a certain feeling – still there's that exactitude.
For example, Ligeti's « interpretative » analysis of Boulez's Structure 1a : puts emphasis on a
specific aspect – pitch orientation – rather than pitch order and disemphasizing. Erotics works only
with art that doesn't show its own making process.
Jonathan Harvey's experiences with altered perception of sound and time (Bhakti, and the Wagner
Dream) invite us to consider pure feeling rather than movement. But this again I believe is an
illusion.
In literature, nice idea of epiphany in Dubliners : sort of a center we didn't know could exist, a focus
launched so far away from the code of the work that it shines bright and this distance doesn't allow
any convincing interpretation due to the two worlds colliding. Same case with Wozzeck (ritornello –
world – cry). Continuous expression on one level is necessary, a sort of Grundgestalt. Urlinie except
it's just it. Somthing so pure that interpretation becomes banal. Something so unbelievably obvious
that all « sites » maps of everybody coincide. Art doesn't proceed FROM its product anymore in
music/ feldman – the phenomena of listening, pacing. In a way, materiality is not the source of
things – it's instead a sort of ideality of touch. Touching without contact. Lâcher le sens en faveur
des sens. Mais mais mais ! L'évidence, certes, mais la justesse, le dominion de la pensée qui dure,
qui peut suivre. Trouver le plus de sens à l'intérieur/ mais catégorie intérieur extérieur est très
perméable – zeitgeist as shows my maps, Mahler's psyche, context in general. Trouver le plus de
croisement, d'impossibilités internes, formelles. Comment la chose émane : herméneutique du
contact avec l'air, avec le sol dans le cas de la pierre, du contact avec where it belongs.

Catharsis : mimesis brings out recognition VIA drama – if you're confronted several times, art
works. Middle age : engaging with subjective topics. Prefers to represent others than himself.
Passions could be represented visually : baroque illusion.
Pari de la reconnaissance mutuelle du signe. Performer has the job of conveying, conjuring.
Performance , being a « making », does not depend on « intuition »
éxégèse : Schleiermacher – modèle pour interprétation du monde de tous les sujets. Censure début
19e sur les textes à utiliser pour éviter conflit social. Ça+ industrialisation different approach to
labor – secularisation of society. More uncertainty no higher force. New social class appearing :
bourgeoisie. Mimesis= appropriation of work by Marx : but distance was created between worker
and work, thus the self cannot manifest itself through labor, it's in fragment. So need for external
actualization – not what you make, but what you see already in world : starting were concerts,
sports. L'interprète apparaît : au lieu de juste réaliser la musique, le contact affaibli avec l'oeuvre
non produite nn sienne, nécéssite la création de conditions de sacralisation de rôles de jeu de
th^éâtre : on cherche à créer des points où se rencontrer, même si plus de liens entre passé et futur.
Dans ce monde fragmenté des centres sans aura. Fear of loss of subject : fascination of mythology,
ruins. Apparition de l'inconscient : on ne contrôle pas ce qu'on fait, ni même ce qu'on est. Culte de
self-expression=text fetishism, canonism. Musical works appears, history.