Tachometer is the yardstick measuring the current state of Art Performance
Place: Kunstverein Tiergarten | Galerie Nord, Turmstraße 75, 10551 Berlin | Germany, Datum: 15./16. February 2008
For two days, gallery Nord | Kunstverein Tiergarten will be showing a cross-section of the current Art Performance-Scene. On the first day, screenings and projections of performances will be giving a perspective of up-to-date productions. In the evening there will be a discussion about this subject. On the second day various performers will be showing their works.
Traditionally, performers tended to encapsulate themselves in stone, be buried in the ground, cut limbs, transplant ears on arms or put horns on their foreheads. The body was the performars primary tool – as it still is today. Oscillating between vanishing points in cyberspace and emerging definitions of social structures, the understanding of performance and body is changing. Current performances examine a certain renaissance of sexual patterns, formarly perceived as faded, as well as today’s interrelated work- and social space.
Contemporary performance reduces actions by means of new media, such as documentary practices in film, and thus connecting to Arte Povera and other minimalist traditions. Art performance, therefore, remains decidedly outside current forms of art-market strategies, but is rather functioning as sozio-critical event. Occasionally roles are even traded between audience and performers. Actors and consumers exchange positions. Furthermore, political implications are placing current performances firmly in society itself, without assuming pedagogical means.
Richard Rabensaat curator
www.kunstverein-tiergarten.de