PERFORMANCE ART From Marina Abramović to Yoko Ono,

Exploring the Boundaries of Artistic

Expression
Nika
WHAT IS PERFORMANCE ART?
A performance involves 4 elements: time, space, the performer's body or presence
in a medium and the relationship between the performer and audience.

Yves Klein
Anthropometry of the Blue
Period (ANT 82), 1960
 Cut
Piece
(1964)
Yoko
Ono
"The body is the medium," Marina Abramovi ć

Chris
Burden,Shoot,
1071.
Kazuo Shiraga,Challenging Mud, 1955
Yayoi Kusama, Anatomic Explosion
on Wall Street, 1968
The work featured nude performers dancing to the
rhythm of bongo drums while Kusama, who called herself
'Priestess', painted blue dots on their naked bodies
and presided over the event. The performance was in
opposition of the Vietnam War and was prefaced by a
press release that stated, "The money made with this
stock is enabling the war to continue. We protest this
cruel, greedy instrument of the war establishment."
After 15 minutes the police came, putting an end to
the spectacle.
“Burn Wall Street. Wall Street men must
become farmers and fisherman. Wall Street
men must stop all of this fake
‘business.’ OBLITERATE WALL STREET MEN
WITH POLKA DOTS. OBLITERATE WALL STREET
MEN WITH POLKA DOTS ON THEIR NAKED BODIES.
BE IN … BE NAKED, NAKED, NAKED.”
An Open Letter to My Hero, Richard M.
Nixon: "Our earth is like one little polka
dot, among millions of other celestial
bodies, one orb full of hatred and strife
amid the peaceful, silent spheres. Let's
you and I change all that and make this
world a new Garden of Eden.... You can't
eradicate violence by using more
violence."
Rythm 0, Marina Abramović, 1974
Instructions:
There are 72 objects on the table that one can use on
me as desired.
Performance.
I am the object...
During this period I take full responsibility.

Duration: 6 hours (8 pm – 2 am)

"What I learned was that ... if you leave it up to the audience,
they can kill you ... I felt really violated: they cut up my
clothes, stuck rose thorns in my stomach, one person aimed the gun
at my head, and another took it away. It created an aggressive
atmosphere. After exactly 6 hours, as planned, I stood up and
started walking toward the audience. Everyone ran away, to escape
an actual confrontation."
“Human beings are afraid of very simple things:
we fear suffering, we fear mortality. What I was
doing in Rhythm 0—as in all my other
performances—was staging these fears for the
audience: using their energy to push my body as
far as possible. In the process, I liberated
myself from my fears. And as this happened, I
became a mirror for the audience—if I could do
it, they could do it, too.”
Coyote: I Like America and
America Likes Me, Joseph
Beouys, 1974
Marina Abramovic,The Artist is Present,2010
 References:
●
https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2020/ap
r/25/marina-abramovic-ulay-walk-the-great-
wall-of-china
●
https://www.tate.org.uk
●
https://www.theartstory.org
●
https://teaching.ellenmueller.com/