Reading week 4

Reading – Week 4

Auslander, P. (1989). ‘Going With the Flow: Performance Art and Mass Culture’ TDR 33:2 pp.119-136

Going With the Flow, by Philip Auslander

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·         This essay looks at the use of technology in performance, particularly video and projection.

·         This has been called “the media generation” by Goldberg. The previous performers were concerned with physical presence in performance, now the spoken word is more important.

·         Primarily, video and film was used to document a performance that was otherwise lost in time.  Video was used to record and preserve evidence of the performance.

·         Nowadays video and film is a commodity, like sound and photograph it is used to create a virtual performance. Technology used in performance has opened up new realms of possibility that was unthinkable 100 years ago.

·         Wegman’s video performance brings into question the demystified performance.’

·         The essay moves away from film and video as a technique to television and film as performance. Theatre and performance was no longer constrained to a theatre, but could now be seen in millions of living rooms worldwide, and not just on television, but through sound recordings and other media outlets like the radio.

·         Laurie Anderson uses ‘highly sophisticated state-of-the-art gadgetry’ to create something visually and aurally spectacular.

·         The essay discusses the relationship between art and mass culture and whether art can remain important or equally as powerful through mass media outlets. If something is not successful through television or other form of mass popular media/culture, then it is seen as a freak show. High art has moved culturally and is now more accessible for the majorities.

·         High art is no longer restricted to high culture or high classes thanks to mass/multi-media.

·         Burnham argues that ‘performance can retain its integrity only by only by choosing to remain in the margins.’ This opens the question, does performance lose something when turned into a mass-media product of television for example.

·         Forte believes that popular/mass cultural performance cannot be marginal because the television makes things mainstream and famous.

·         Is there a line between marginal and marketable? If so, where?

·         The essay goes on to argue that the above may not be true, that it is facile to believe that performance loses its subversive potential when introduced to mass culture. However, it is possible for mass cultural performance to challenge the mainstream, for example, the television performance may do this by denying closure and disrupting the narrative.

·         The essay highlights Raymond William’s view on Television, that it is made up of three levels; the overall impression of the day of entertainment including all breaks, adverts, etc; images that occur; and the flow of words.

·         Polan also discusses these flows and agrees that each image and word adds up to the overall impact of the ‘performance’.

·         However, live performance cannot (generally) be controlled by the audience, whereas performance through media, such as a television programme, can be turned off, down, over. Therefore, media has shifted power from the performer to the audience.

·         Live concerts have to be rehearsed and the recording is usually available beforehand, and this turns performance on its head, because an audience for a TV programme will not read the script beforehand.

·         Film, music, television and plays all have the same thing to offer the audience, the performer’s persona. This can only be a good thing for a practitioner/performer if they have a selection of media outlets.

·         Performance through mass culture (television, film) can be liberating.

·         Even though mass culture is based at a large audience demographic, it may only be viewed/witnessed by individuals. This means that the mass has turned into individual.

·         Owen’s point is expressed, ‘ postmodernist art does not position itself outside the practices it holds up for scrutiny. It problematizes, but does not reject, the representational means it shares with other cultural practices.’