The Case for Performance Art | The Art Assignment | PBS Digital Studios

Dubious of performance art? Break into a cold sweat when you realize it’s about to begin? There’s a reason. Here we present you with a brief history of performance art and attempt to sway you to its potential charms. Let us know if you buy it.

[PikaChanv]

There's so much info on these videos that i spend hours pausing them so i can investigate all pieces and artists, i wanna go to sleep but i can't. I thank you for the existance of this channel

[katehavlik]

"Art should not be separate from life, but an action within life, with all of the accidents and chaos and occasional beauty that that entails". YES YES YES YES.

[AnnoyingAsianWitch]

I love this channel! Instead of just saying "I don't get it" or "That's ugly" or "That's weird" I will now think twice about artists and how their art is presented and why.

[FarahAFahmi]

Wow. Thank you, Sarah Green and everyone else behind this. I'm someone who is clueless when it comes to art, and I gotta tell you, this is so thought-provoking and mind-opening. Thank you.

From an Egyptian living in Saudi Arabia.

[megalyssa]

I don't know much about art. In fact, I don't get art most of the time. But I've always loved learning. I just found this channel and it's so cool. I'd love more videos on performance art

[HeidiVids]

When I was in London in May I visited Tate Britain. There were dancers in matching outfits and it was my first experience with performance art. Since then it has interested me and this video was really insightful!

[animefan]

As an art student, I thank you for these videos!
Really helping in my finals.

[CrumpArt]

I saw the very first performance of the Dachshund U.N. in Melbourne back in 2010. I've never been happier to see a piece of performance art. There were so many dachshunds wandering around Fitzroy for hours afterwards.

[gabe_s_videos]

I've been really getting into avant garde and various other forms of modern art lately, and the thing I love about it is that, whether or not you like the art itself, it's always an experience unlike any other. Whatever I'm seeing or hearing is the only thing like it in the world. I'm also starting to appreciate this idea that part of the art and the experience of it is the individual's interpretation. Art can and should evoke feelings, but it's not the same as, say, entertainment, which almost exclusively tries to evoke some kind of deliberate catharsis. Even when non-entertainment art is meant to tell you, even convince you of, one thing and one thing only, what it MEANS is and should be different to everyone. It tells them more about themselves that it does the art or the person who made it. What you take from it is informed almost entirely what you bring to it with your own thoughts, feelings and experiences ("the love you take is equal to the love you make" etc.).

As such, I don't think "uncomfortable" was the right word to end this video on. Art should definitely make you think about things, about your own feelings, your feelings about the world around you and of your place in it, and that can look like anything: it can be discomfort, but it can also be enlightenment, catharsis, politics, values, humanity, humility, joy, sadness, anger, or something you can't even put into words, but it'll be something you wouldn't have thought about until you saw the art. Art is meant to make you think about things, but not what to think OF them. We have enough things in the world telling us what to think.

The idea that it should only make you uncomfortable, to me, is not only too negative but also dismisses the thing that makes art great in the first place, that whatever it's about, what it means is what it means to you and you alone.

But of course, that's all just one person's interpretation.

[Fcutdlady]

This is why i love dada artists

What is dada? the Dada movement consisted of artists who rejected the logic, reason, and aestheticism of modern capitalist society, instead expressing nonsense, irrationality, and anti-bourgeois protest in their works. The art of the movement spanned visual, literary, and sound media, including collage, sound poetry, cut-up writing, and sculpture. Dadaist artists expressed their discontent toward violence, war, and nationalism, and maintained political affinities with the radical far-left.

[iamsuccessful]

nice to see and read the comments some people begun to quite understand performance art and art in general.... especially to where are is right now and where it is leading to in performance art for me like any other medium of art is a sort of like mystical and unearthly manner of communicating through codes, spaces, or through total interaction or giving an idea through a secret language or slamming it right on the face for people to art now is more about questioning and experimenting our emotions, comfortability, security as person, our ideals and beliefs, and our very being of rational thinkers who loves to ask and question our world and wonder of the beauty around hope more people will try to do art even just one time in their study history of art, appreciate and learn from masters of the past and present, learn some traditions and but after knowing and immersing in the art of yesterday and today and after reflecting and appreciating the very art itself of human development over time in history, is the time to ask for yourself what art is, to begin questioning your own existence and experiences, experimenting your resources, and touching your emotions, to create your own art a bit different from those of today and yesterday, and to break all the rules and traditions you already knew from do it for art and experimentation and not to offend and intentionally nonsense or unconscious thinking of doing art....but after all art is generally accepted as subjective..so who knows what art really is....for it's impulse, spontaneous, like a snap or a blink....ever changing, ever asking, ever experimenting, ever making us feel and experience a bit of freedom under our own control and capacity...but it has reason...it has something asking for..or something experiencing for...maybe a still subject of a painting...or the subject of emotion and interactive concept like in performance art... :) just my opinions....and just sharing. peace.

[KannikCat]

I totally buy it. I've been fortunate to happen upon performance art (or perhaps the performance art happens upon me...) and I love the experience. Even that uncomfortableness. Even when, and especially when, I'm left with more ?? marks than anything. Gets me thinking and lets me explore and discover in a way that a representational painting might not. Plus I admire the courage and gusto of the performers. :) Great stuff, and a great episode! I really appreciate how you noted that the awkwardness can be seen as a perfect entry point to engaging with the art rather than a cue to run for the doors. (Unless running for the doors is part of the art piece... ;)

[theresacarpinelli]

Returning back to this video 7 years later while I'm getting ready to see the Marina Abramovic retrospective at the Royal Academy. So good as always.

[KayWhyz]

I dunno, this became sort of difficult for me to rationalize when the video discussed the performance art schools, and then went on to say performance art was a comment against the commercialization of art because it offered artists "a way to make art outside of the often-oppressive market system." This seems like an extremely unaware thing to say when we talk about economic privilege. Like, how well-off would one had to have been in order to attend one of those schools for performance art? And just because the art isn't able to be commodified in a way that one can buy it doesn't mean it operations outside of the market system—it costs something like $30 to get into MoMA, which might not be a lot for for some, but is absolutely restricting to others. And how well-off do one of these artists need to be in order to practice performance art in lieu of having a job? When discussing stuff like market forces and art, I think it pays to be aware of the artist's relative privilege. So, yeah, I guess I "buy" performance art, but only because it's not really free.

[TLWheatman]

Powerful episode. I am a performer and this led me to Wow, what I had not considered. Now I understand. Brilliant.

[MrRookitty]

The dachshund UN sounds like a good time.

[subplantant]

Fabulous video. Last minutes were strangely moving. Glad this channel exists.

[XPartiste]

1:40 Oskar Schlemmer
4:12 Allan Kaprow - Household
6:01 Joan Jonas - Mirror Performance 1
6:39 Jannis Kounellis Untitled

[TaylorJohnsonvideo]

This is so good. I probably need to watch this 10 more times to fully unpack everything in it. I love Marina Abramovic.

[coryecker]

The Art Assignment is single-handedly saving the art world. To be able to discuss these topics with deep appreciation and respect with zero cynicism is so important. I have so much respect for this channel. All art deserves to be understood. what a beautiful answer to the resounding "Why?" that too often is asked of more challenging artistic movements. Keep up the good work.