Emma Carleschi
The paradigm for a genuine and alternative art history is embedded in ‘artistic practise which is shaped by concrete social relations, and works within and on socially produced ideologies.’[1] In fact, ‘it is impossible to understand women’s class position without understanding the way in which sexual divisions shape women’s consciousness of class.’[2] Carrying on an induction on this statement, it is impossible to understand the new tactics and techniques used by feminists in conceptual art without gaining an understanding of the social-historical relations that led to these significant changes in the art world.
As it will be analysed, feminist artists ‘used performance as a means of confronting the traditional role of the woman as the passive object of male desire in Western Art and deconstructing this naturalized position, foregrounding women’s agency and authorship in the process.’[3] In fact, ‘the history of modern art is presented as an internal, immanent process amongst the artists; abstract arises because, as the author says, representational art had been exhausted.’ The traditional medium of painting and sculpture lost its function in this period; therefore, a new type of medium had to arise to satisfy the subjects feminist artists wanted to represent. Artists like Andrea Fraser and the Guerrilla Girls, chose to shift and liberate themselves from the long-established medium of painting, which has historically and socially been dominated by patriarchism and male-superiority, to innovative types of art and its media, such as conceptualism and performance art. Fraser herself stated that she stopped painting at eighteen, under the ‘influence of conceptualism and critique of the cultural commodity’[4]. The works which will be discussed also encompass a topic that these artists have been intensely critical about, and that reiterates the issue of sexism in the art world: the institutionalization of the museum. I will analyze two extensively effective examples of this new approach to performance art: Fraser’s Men on the Line: Men Committed to Feminism, KPFK, 1972 (2012) and the Guerrilla Girls’ The Advantages of Being a Female Artist (1989).
As Richard Schechner has theorised, ‘performance is a ritualised behaviour’[5] conditioned and permeated by ‘play’. Moreover, the type of ‘play’ the feminist interventions we are discussing took over is what Schechner, in more detail, denominates ‘dark play’. This type of play engages with satire and mockery to ‘subvert the meta-communicative message “this is play.”’[6] This means that artists used this type of technology (parody, satire, comedy) to draw attention to graver, more important issues. In the feminist agenda, that was the absolute inequality in the institutionalised art world embodied in the museum, produced by a sexist, male dominated society. Performance art also implied a very important phenomenon in modern art, the ‘dematerialization’ of the art object, which results in the demystification of the work of art and in the de-idolatry of the space in which the ‘mystic items’ are kept: the museum. A new understanding of the ‘work of art’ arises. It is no longer the product of work, the object, which can only be admired from a distance. It is the event, which calls for the audience’s participation and activeness. An analysis of the two works of art will uncover how the use of performance as a new medium is crucial for the artists to deliver their message efficaciously.
ANDREA FRASER'S MEN ON THE LINE: MANSPLANING FEMINISM IN DRAG:
Andrea Fraser’s Men on the Line (2012) incorporates the subverting and untraditional media of ‘performance’ on multiform dual levels. The Schechnerian idea of performance functions as foundation in this work, all the while another understanding of the word ‘performance’ is put into place in this work: ‘gender performance’, or more correctly ‘gender performativity.’ According to Judith Butler[7], gender performativity is the acting, either consciously or unconsciously, of gender norms. The so-called ‘gender norms’ are, essentially, archetypes that have been produced and re-produced in social, historical and cultural relations that we use to separate what is attributed to ‘masculinity’ and what to ‘femininity’. In Men on the Line, Fraser personifies four men (identified as Lee Christie, Everett Frost, Bob Kreuger and Jeremy Shapiro), discussing the feminist movements of the time in relation to their experience as men in a radio broadcast dated 1972. In her dressing some what androgynously, and adopting gestures, characteristics and bodily positions attached to the male figure, such as manspreading and lowering her voice, Fraser is subtly addressing to the narrow minded perception of what is ‘masculine’ and what is ‘feminine’, according to the gender norms that make us associate particular body traits to a binary of man/woman. By, furthermore, exaggerating these traits she produces humour to engage better with the audience, while still maintaining her hypercritical viewpoint, conforming to Schechner’s idea of ‘dark play’. Other humorous components such as a man tearing up as he says ‘I can cook now’[8], juxtaposed with the testimony of a man saying that the first ‘mental act’ his brain sets up when he is confronted with a human is to categorize their gender, because the way he would approach a woman is different from the way he would a man, all want to focus on the way these men talk about feminism while never questioning women’s experience of it, solely focusing on themselves and how feminism impacts them. Additionally, the element of ‘drag’ in Fraser’s performance intends to state that ‘if gender is performative, then it follows that the reality of gender is itself produced as an act of performance.’[9] Thus, the environment of the ‘consciousness raising group’ is made even more comic and, at the same time, criticized because while the four men create an act of separatism reinforcing the binary/dichotomy of men/women by talking of women and feminism as ‘the other’, Fraser’s appearance only undoes this as it blurs completely the gender norms, and in her presence the binary is no longer a binary but a spectrum in which Fraser plays to disrupt even more the idea of sexual difference and inequality. In Butler’s opinion, furthermore, the idea of drag enters the discussion of politics as it is a way to expose an underline how gender is based on performativity, and how, moreover, the norms that encase gender can be questioned, and ‘new modes of reality’ can be ‘instituted’.[10] In conclusion, the choice of Fraser to adopt the specific novel medium of performing in her work Men on the Line is crucial to achieve the emotional impact she wants to have on her audience, and also a way for her to increase the intensity of her political critique. In fact, through the process of ‘performing the other’, Fraser is creating a synthesis between the personal and the political. In a speech regarding her exhibition L’1% c’est moi, she explained that ‘engaging the personal and the political together is one of the principals of my work. It is a principal I understand is coming out of traditions of feminist art and activism, research and critical engagement with the social.’[11]
Andrea Fraser, L'1% c'est moi.
GUERRILLA GIRLS: RADICAL ART AS PERFORMANCE:
The other artwork that is going to be observed in this text is The Advantages of Being a Woman Artist (1989) by the collective art group Guerrilla Girls. At the base of their philosophy and activism is the aim to make the art world more inclusive, and to fight racism and sexism in that environment. As Stephanie L. Rhyner has pointed out, ‘although this group is first and foremost an activist group, each of their actions, which include posters, speeches, letter writing campaign, books protests and exhibitions, are all part of their performance as activist in opposition to art world discrimination.’[12] The type of performance that the Guerrilla Girls engage with is, prevalently, public performance[13]. Public performance is, in fact, the staging of events such as protests, songs in the public space, in order to convey socio-political issues in ways that allow the audience to participate more, as well as democratizing art and the narrative of particular issues that would traditionally be reserved to a more elitist setting.[14] In this case, public performance and the idea of performance as a ‘ritualized behaviour conditioned and permeated by play’[15] and the concept of ‘dark play’ work together to deliver the performance in the most powerful way.
We have previously dealt with how Schechner has defined ‘performance’. As done with Fraser’s work, this paragraph will serve to analyse one particular work of the Guerrilla Girls in order to expose how their choice to adopt the medium of performance was essential to accomplish the task they had set for the collective. Their most frequently adopted medium was the poster. Both the item itself, through their particular use of ‘play’ and language, and the idea of the print worked effectively to convey information in two ways: qualitatively and quantitatively. As Kathe Kollowitz ecplains. ‘it’s a new paradigm compared to the old marker model where the artwork gets more and more expensive and more rare as it gets better known’[16]. The accessibility of the print is what allows them to be able to diffuse an extensive amount of posters in the public space, as well as demystifying the idea that artworks can only exist in the museum. In ‘Transgressive Techniques of the Guerrilla Girls’, Frida Kahlo and Kathe Kollwitz explain their method of delivering information in order to force the viewer’s attention. They asked themselves ‘how do you take a subject no one wants to be reminded of – discrimination in art – and present it in a way that can’t be ignored?’[17] This question can be answered through the definitions of performance and dark play theorised by Schechner. In The Advantages of Being a Woman Artist, the use of sarcasm, humour and rhetoric is put into place to bring the viewer’s attention on substantial political issues: ‘working without the pressure of success’, ‘not having to undergo the embarrassment of being called a genius’ are all ironic ways to bring the audience’s attention to the absurd inequality and inferiority that women are subject to in the art world, where it’s almost impossible for women to succeed, and where it is inconceivable to think that a woman might produce ground breaking ideas. The use of language goes beyond the indexical, which, in semiotics, is what ‘refers directly to the circumstances or context in which an utterance takes place.’[18] In this case, in fact, the language used does not directly refer to its index; through the use of rhetoric and sarcasm, it takes up the opposite meaning, making the sentences seem like actual advantages. After an analysis within the context in which the collective acts, it is obvious how irony and comedy is put into place to deliver a hyper critique of discrimination in the art world.
Guerrilla Girls, The Advantages of Being a Woman Artist.
‘The Guerrilla Girls’ technique of ‘creating their own phrases and fonts (…) could be viewed as subverting the language and ideology of consumer capitalism while
simultaneously using concepts of branding and advertising to create their own specific identities but, significantly, without relying on the use of the hand-written signature or ‘original’, ‘unique’ medium of traditional artworks, such as painting.’[19]
It is through the prevailing use of public performance and of performance as ‘dark play’ that the Guerrilla Girls can effectively achieve their goal of accessibility and inclusivity, as well as the critique of institutionalization like museums, their elitism and exclusiveness.
It has, ultimately, been shown how feminist interventionists felt the need to formulate a new type of expression in contrast with historically patriarchal medium of painting and critiquing the male-dominant environment of the museum, with the example of performance art applied to the works of Andrea Fraser and the Guerrilla Girls. The analysis was supported by theoretical work on performance by Richard Schechner, on gender performance by Judith Butler and on public performance by Bradford D. Martin. The aim of the analysis of the works through the use of theory was of demonstrating the crucial element the medium of performance played in them, in order for the artists to convey their messages effictively.
[1] Griselda Pollock, ‘Women, Art and Ideology: Questions for Art Historians’, Woman’s Art Journal, vol.4, no.1 (1983), p.39 < https://www.jstor.org/stable/40004832> [2] Jean Gardiner, ‘Women in the Labour Process and Class Structure’ in Class and Class Structure, A. Hunt, ed. (London: Lawrence and Wishart, 1977), p.163 [3] Olivia Gauthier, 'Andrea Fraser Puts Male Feminism on the Line', Hyperallergic, , (2019), , in < https://hyperallergic.com/513290/andrea-fraser-men-on-the-line-hammer-museum/> [4]Nicholas Grider, Strategies For Contemporary Feminism - Andrea Fraser (Valencia, California, 2007) <https://vimeo.com/12633024> [5] Schechner in Stephanie Rhyner, Satirical Warfare: Guerrilla Girls' Performance And Activism From 1985-1995, 1st edn (University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2015), p.4. < https://dc.uwm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1837&context=etd> [6] Schechner in Stephanie Rhyner, Satirical Warfare: Guerrilla Girls' Performance And Activism From 1985-1995, 1st edn (University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2015), p.5. < https://dc.uwm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1837&context=etd> [7] Judith Butler, Gender Trouble, (London: Routledge, 2006). [8] Andrea Fraser, Men On The Line: Men Committed To Feminism, KPFK, 1972 (Los Angeles, 2012). < https://vimeo.com/200697193> [9] Judith Butler, Undoing Gender, (London: Routledge, 2004), p.218 [10] Judith Butler, Undoing Gender, (London: Routledge, 2004), p.217 [11] Andrea Fraser, L'1% C'est Moi (Barcelona: MACBA Barcelona, 2016) < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bx4D8_2nO_Q> [12] Stephanie Rhyner, Satirical Warfare: Guerrilla Girls' Performance And Activism From 1985-1995, 1st edn (University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2015), p.ii/iii. <https://dc.uwm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1837&context=etd> [13] Ibid, p. 7 [14]Bradford D. Martin, The Theater Is In The Street: Politics And Public Performance In 1960S America (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2004), p. 3. [15]Stephanie Rhyner, Satirical Warfare: Guerrilla Girls' Performance And Activism From 1985-1995, 1st edn (University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2015), p.4. < https://dc.uwm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1837&context=etd> [16] Kathe Kollowitz in Nicola McCartney, Death Of The Artist: Art World Dissidents And Their Alternative Identities (International Library Of Modern And Contemporary Art) (London: I.B Tauris, 2018), p. 120. [17] Transgressive techniques of the guerrilla girls, p.203 Kahlo, Frida, and Kathe Kollwitz. “Transgressive Techniques of the Guerrilla Girls.” Getty Research Journal, no. 2, 2010, pp. 203–208. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/23005421. Accessed 29 Feb. 2020. [18]Richard Nordquist, "Examples Of Indexicality (Language)", Thought.Co, 2019 <https://www.thoughtco.com/indexicality-language-term-1691055> [19]Nicola McCartney, Death Of The Artist: Art World Dissidents And Their Alternative Identities (International Library Of Modern And Contemporary Art) (London: I.B Tauris, 2018), p. 118