Artificial hells : participatory art and the politics of spectatorship / Claire Bishop.

By: Bishop, Claire .

Material type: materialTypeLabel

BookPublisher: London ; New York : Verso Books, 2012Description: 382 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm.Content type: text Media type: unmediated Carrier type: volumeISBN: 9781844676903; 1844676900; 1844677966 (ebook); 9781844677962 (ebook).Subject(s): Interactive art

DDC classification: 709.0407

Contents:

The social turn: collaboration and its discontents --- Artificial hells: the historic avant-garde --- Je participe, tu participes, il participe --- Social sadism made explicit --- The social under socialism --- Incidental people: APG and community arts --- Former West: art as project in the early 1990s --- Delegated performance: outsourcing authenticity --- Pedagogic projects: \'how do you bring a classroom to life as if it were a work of art?\' --- Conclusion: spectacle and participation.

Summary: Since the 1990s, critics and curators have broadly accepted the notion that participatory art is the ultimate political art: that by encouraging an audience to take part an artist can promote new emancipatory social relations. Around the world, the champions of this form of expression are numerous, ranging from art historians such as Grant Kester, curators such as Nicolas Bourriaud and Nato Thompson, to performance theorists such as Shannon Jackson. Artificial Hells is the first historical and theoretical overview of socially engaged participatory art, known in the US as social practice. Claire Bishop follows the trajectory of twentieth-century art and examines key moments in the development of a participatory aesthetic. This itinerary takes in Futurism and Dada; the Situationist International; Happenings in Eastern Europe, Argentina and Paris; the 1970s Community Arts Movement; and the Artists Placement Group. It concludes with a discussion of long-term educational projects by contemporary artists such as Thomas Hirschhorn, Tania Bruguera, Pawel Althamer and Paul Chan. Since her controversial essay in Artforum in 2006, Claire Bishop has been one of the few to challenge the political and aesthetic ambitions of participatory art. In Artificial Hells, she not only scrutinizes the emancipatory claims made for these projects, but also provides an alternative to the ethical (rather than artistic) criteria invited by such artworks. Artificial Hells calls for a less prescriptive approach to art and politics, and for more compelling, troubling and bolder forms of participatory art and criticism. -- Back cover.

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Holdings
Item type	Current library	Call number	Copy number	Status	Date due	Barcode	Item holds
General Lending	MTU Crawford College of Art and Design Library Lending	709.0407 (Browse shelf(Opens below))	1	Checked out	29/03/2024	00196174
General Lending	MTU Crawford College of Art and Design Library Lending	709.0407 (Browse shelf(Opens below))	1	Available		00196227

Total holds: 0

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

This searing critique of participatory art--from its development to its political ambitions--is "an essential title for contemporary art history scholars and students as well as anyone who has . . . thought, 'Now that's art!' or 'That's art?'" ( Library Journal )

Since the 1990s, critics and curators have broadly accepted the notion that participatory art is the ultimate political art: that by encouraging an audience to take part an artist can promote new emancipatory social relations. Around the world, the champions of this form of expression are numerous, ranging from art historians such as Grant Kester, curators such as Nicolas Bourriaud and Nato Thompson, to performance theorists such as Shannon Jackson.

Artificial Hells is the first historical and theoretical overview of socially engaged participatory art, known in the US as "social practice." Claire Bishop follows the trajectory of twentieth-century art and examines key moments in the development of a participatory aesthetic. This itinerary takes in Futurism and Dada; the Situationist International; Happenings in Eastern Europe, Argentina and Paris; the 1970s Community Arts Movement; and the Artists Placement Group. It concludes with a discussion of long-term educational projects by contemporary artists such as Thomas Hirschhorn, Tania Bruguera, Pawel Althamer and Paul Chan.

Since her controversial essay in Artforum in 2006, Claire Bishop has been one of the few to challenge the political and aesthetic ambitions of participatory art. In Artificial Hells , she not only scrutinizes the emancipatory claims made for these projects, but also provides an alternative to the ethical (rather than artistic) criteria invited by such artworks. Artificial Hells calls for a less prescriptive approach to art and politics, and for more compelling, troubling, and bolder forms of participatory art and criticism.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 287-363) and index.

Since the 1990s, critics and curators have broadly accepted the notion that participatory art is the ultimate political art: that by encouraging an audience to take part an artist can promote new emancipatory social relations. Around the world, the champions of this form of expression are numerous, ranging from art historians such as Grant Kester, curators such as Nicolas Bourriaud and Nato Thompson, to performance theorists such as Shannon Jackson. Artificial Hells is the first historical and theoretical overview of socially engaged participatory art, known in the US as social practice. Claire Bishop follows the trajectory of twentieth-century art and examines key moments in the development of a participatory aesthetic. This itinerary takes in Futurism and Dada; the Situationist International; Happenings in Eastern Europe, Argentina and Paris; the 1970s Community Arts Movement; and the Artists Placement Group. It concludes with a discussion of long-term educational projects by contemporary artists such as Thomas Hirschhorn, Tania Bruguera, Pawel Althamer and Paul Chan. Since her controversial essay in Artforum in 2006, Claire Bishop has been one of the few to challenge the political and aesthetic ambitions of participatory art. In Artificial Hells, she not only scrutinizes the emancipatory claims made for these projects, but also provides an alternative to the ethical (rather than artistic) criteria invited by such artworks. Artificial Hells calls for a less prescriptive approach to art and politics, and for more compelling, troubling and bolder forms of participatory art and criticism. -- Back cover.

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

Introduction (p. 1)
1 The Social Turn: Collaboration and Its Discontents (p. 11)
2 Artificial Hells: The Historic Avant-garde (p. 41)
3 Je participe, tu participes, il participe ... (p. 77)
4 Social Sadism Made Explicit (p. 105)
5 The Social Under Socialism (p. 129)
6 Incidental People: APG and Community Arts (p. 163)
7 Former West: Art as Project in the Early 1990s (p. 193)
8 Delegated Performance: Outsourcing Authenticity (p. 219)
9 Pedagogic Projects: 'How do you bring a classroom to life as if it were a work of art?' (p. 241)
Conclusion (p. 275)
Notes (p. 285)
Acknowledgements (p. 363)
Illustration Credits (p. 365)
Index (p. 373)

Reviews provided by Syndetics

Library Journal Review

Bishop (art history, CUNY Graduate Ctr.; Installation Art: A Critical History and Participation) focuses squarely on participatory art, including Andre Breton's 1921 Parisian Grande Saison Dada, a season full of sensational performances that has been internationally popular since the early 1990s. The title is both a positive and negative descriptor of participatory art, which Bishop identifies as art that requires the involvement of many people. The book is divided into three parts: key terms and motivations, historical case studies, and a history of the post-1989 period that focuses on two contemporary tendencies in participatory art: "delegated performance" and "pedagogic projects." VERDICT An essential title for contemporary art history scholars and students as well as anyone who has witnessed a participatory art "happening" and thought "Now, that's art!" or "That's art?"-Jennifer H. Krivickas, Univ. of Cincinnati Lib. (c) Copyright 2012. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Publishers Weekly Review

Since the early 1990s, there has been significant global artistic interest in participation and collaboration in conceptual and performance art. In this critically astute and provocative study, City University of New York art historian Bishop (Installation Art: A Critical History) analyzes the meaning of what results from participatory art rather than solely emphasizing its artistic process. Bishop divides her incisive and meticulously researched study of participatory art into three sections: a theoretical introduction to the genre, contextualizing it in the Italian Futurists, Russian proletkult, and Dada; case studies in participatory art such as the Situationist International, Argentinian art of the late 1960s led by Oscar Masotta, and Brazilian director Augusto Boal's theater of social change; and contemporary art performance and pedagogy. Bishop's arguments are convincingly supported and potentially very contentious. She suggests that participatory art makes the ethics of interpersonal interaction more important than politics and social justice concerns, and that activist art is not enough for social change-other institutions are necessary. A critically challenging work of vital scholarship, the book will be of greatest interest to art historians, art theorists, artists, and cultural critics. (July) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

CHOICE Review

Bishop (CUNY Graduate Center) analyzes participatory art from an interdisciplinary position. Bishop's participatory art references "socially engaged art, community-based art, experimental communities, dialogic art, littoral art, interventionist art, collaborative art, contextual art, and social practice," among other types. What are the discursive criteria of socially engaged art, which, as live performance, traditionally subverts commodity-based production and conventional passive spectatorship? When people become the artist's medium, the usual production methods, aesthetic quality, and consumption become irrelevant, and morals, ethics, and politics move to the critical forefront. Traditional visual-based analysis of individually produced objects is insufficient when dealing with artist-performers orchestrating a project, happening, performance, demonstration, or event that may be collective in origin but obtains importance from an engagement with people and social processes unfolding, in some instances, over time. Bishop's survey of the historical origins of these varied creative practices permits her to address the many questions surrounding participatory art's contemporary function, individual and social goals, and the allied tension of critical evaluation--the mediator between act and understanding. This meticulous and methodologically sound work will be the standard resource for many years to come. Summing Up: Essential. Upper-division undergraduates and above. W. B. Folkestad Colorado State University--Pueblo

Author notes provided by Syndetics

Claire Bishop is Associate Professor in the PhD Program in Art History at CUNY Graduate Center, New York. She is the author of Installation Art: A Critical History and Editor of Participation. In 2008 she co-curated the exhibition 'Double Agent' at the ICA, London. She is a regular contributor to Artforum, October, e-flux, and other international art magazines.