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On art and life

Since the early 1970s, Marina Abramović has explored the relationship between performer and audience, the interaction between people, the limits of the body, and the possibilities of the mind. She said: ‘the experience I learned was that … if you leave decision to the public, you can be killed… I felt really violated: they cut 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 public. Everyone ran away, escaping an actual confrontation’ about her art performance Rhythm O, an experiment to explore the relationship between the artist and the public, which brought to my mind the Stanford prison experiment, by Phillip Zimbardo, which demonstrated that when people are empowered by authority or lack of external laws and rules, there is the possibility of their becoming aggressive and outright abusive to those without power.

‘We are always in the space in-between… all the spaces where you are not actually at home. You haven’t arrived yet…. This is where our mind is the most open. We are alert, we are sensitive, and destiny can happen. We do not have any barriers and we are vulnerable. Vulnerability is important. It means we are completely alive and this is an extremely important space. This is for me the space from which my work generates’ Marina Abramovic

‘It is incredible how fear is built into you, by your parents and others surrounding you. You’re so innocent in the beginning; you don’t know’ Marina Abramović: Walk Through Walls: Becoming Marina Abramovic

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Art and freedom

Extracts from the Manifesto on Artists’ Rights by Tania Bruguera (from ‘Why Are We Artists?: 100 World Art Manifestos, Jessica Lack, 2017, Penguin Modern Classics)

  • Art is not a luxury. Art is a basic social need to which everyone has a right.
  • Art is a way to build thinking, of being aware of oneself and of the others at the same time. It is a methodology for the search of a here and now in constant transformation.
  • Art is an invitation to question; it is the social place of doubt, of wanting to understand and of wanting to change reality.
  • Art is not only a statement of the present, it is also a call for a better future. Therefore, it is a right not only to enjoy art, but to be able to create it.
  • Art is a common good that does not have to be understood in its totality.
  • Art is a space of vulnerability from which what is social is deconstructed to construct what is human…..
  • Artists have the right to disagree not only with affective, moral, philosophical, or cultural aspects, but also with economic and political ones.
  • Artists have the right to disagree with power, with the status quo.
  • Artists have the right to be respected and protected when they dissent……
  • Artists also have the right to be understood in the complexity of their disagreement. Artists should not be judged but discussed. And certainly artists should not be put in jail for proposing an “other” reality, for sharing their ideas, for wanting to strike up a conversation on the way the present unfolds. If the artist proposal is not understood, it should be discussed by all, not censored by a few………
  • Artists have the right to create the work they want to create, with no limits; they have the duty to be responsible without self-censure……
  • Artistic censorship not only affects artists but also the communities they inhabit. It creates fear and self-censorship in them. It paralyzes the possibility to exercise critical thinking………………
  • A society with freedom of artistic expression is a healthier society. It is a society where citizens are allowed to dream of a better world where they have a place. It is a society that expresses itself better, because it expresses itself in its entire complexity…………….

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Where boundaries dissolve

“The music faded in the large hall, but Ermine’s heart filled with a happiness he longed to share. With a nod of her grey head, the mother eagle motioned to her son that it was time for Ermine to return home. As the young eagle, with Ermine on his back, dove off the mountainsiide into the icy mist, the old mother called out, When your people have learned to use the gift of song to break the silence, your brothers will be released. And then I will receive my gift in return”

(The Eagle’s Song: A Tale from the Pacific Northwest, adapted and illustrated by Kristina Rodanas)