No Innocent Bystanders: Performance Art and Audience (Interfaces: Studies in Visual Culture)

Ward, Frazer

ISBN 10: 1611683343 ISBN 13: 9781611683349

Publisher: Dartmouth College Press, 2012

Synopsis

At a moment when performance art and performance generally are at the center of the international art world, Frazer Ward offers us insightful readings of major performance pieces by the likes of Acconci, Burden, Abramovi , and Hsieh, and confronts the twisting and troubled relationship that performance art has had with the spectator and the public sphere. Ward contends that the ethical challenges with which performance art confronts its viewers speak to the reimagining of the audience, in terms that suggest the collapse of notions like "public" and "community." A thoughtful, even urgent discussion of the relationship between art and the audience that will appeal to a broad range of art historians, artists, and others interested in constructions of the public sphere.

About this title

Review:

Oxford Art Journal"

Ward has pulled off the impressive feat of navigating thecomplex theoretical positions of performance art and itshistories, in a way that is both engaging and instructive, whilewidening established debates. Oxford Art Journal"

"Ward has pulled off the impressive feat of navigating the complex theoretical positions of performance art and its histories, in a way that is both engaging and instructive, while widening established debates."-- "Oxford Art Journal"

About the Author:

FRAZER WARD is an associate professor of art history at Smith College. His work appears widely in books, catalogs, and journals.

About this edition

• Publisher: Dartmouth College Press
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 1611683343
• ISBN 13: 9781611683349
• Binding: Library Binding
• Number of pages: 224