Monday 19 November 2012

Rhythm 0 and Human Nature


Marina Abramović is a renowned artist that specializes in performance art over three decades because of her daring, thrilling and inspiring performances.

Before reviewing the artwork that I have chosen, it is important to know more about her early life because there is a strong relationship between her background and meaning of those performances. And I found Abramović and her younger brother were controlled in a complete military way by mother, for example, she was requested to go back home before ten o'clock at night until she was twenty nine years old. The strict rules did not limit her mind although they worked physically. The oppressed live made her become an artistic vanguard in the Nineteen Seventies. And I will give more details during the presentation. 

When I chose which work is going to be my artist review, I found that Rhythm Series which aims at exploring the limitation of the human body and the possibility of remaining conscious mind impressed me. Before Rhythm 0, the most controversial one, was performed, Rhythm 10 was also a clear illustration to show how dare Abramović was. People including me will have a strong desire to know more or watch live performance directly after seeing the below pictures. 

Twenty knives and two tape recorders were the only things in this physical damaging performance. Her hand was  splayed open on a table and she picked a knife to stab the space between fingers rapidly until she hurt, then she used the other knife to play this Russian game again and the whole process was recorded. After twenty knives had been used up, she played the tape, tried to repeat the same movement and synchronized even the moment she hurt. The stabbing sounds and screeches were performed to the audiences doubly. But you may wonder why I need to spend time on describing Rhythm 10 instead of simply talking about my feelings to the Rhythm 0.

Because I think Abramović 's works, not only the Rhythm Series, but also the Works With Ulay who had been her partner and important person for more than twelve years, have their own goals to explore. I am not sure whether my guess is true or not, but I believe there must be some co-relation between Rhythm 10 and 0. To me, Rhythm 10 represents the physical and mental torture made by herself under consciousness. At the same time, Rhythm 0 is similar, but the only difference is Abramović's pain and fear are caused by other people. Again, I will further explain during my presentation.

Rhythm 0 is an experiment to test the relationship between artist and participants. Indeed, it is the most dangerous one because Abramović tried to let herself be an object and allow the audiences to do whatever they want in the following six hours. Seventy-two objects were placed on a table and they included a rose, a feather, honey, a whip, scissors, a scalpel, a gun and a single bullet. Each people can use these things to manipulate Abramović. Rhythm 0 is an experiment to test the relationship between artist and participants. Indeed, it is the most dangerous one because Abramović tried to let herself be an object and allow the audiences to do whatever they want in the following six hours. Seventy-two objects were placed on a table and they included a rose, a feather, honey, a whip, scissors, a scalpel, a gun and a single bullet. Each people can use these things to manipulate Abramović's body.

“I felt really violated: they cut up my clothes, stuck rose thorns in my stomach, one person aimed the gun at my head, and another took it away." As recalled by Abramović, the result was incredibly terrible. At first, participants behaved cautiously until longer time passed. And...“What I learned was that... if you leave it up to the audience, they can kill you.”To me, the performance reveals the human nature and I recall the Stanford prison experiment which states that when a people is empowered with authority, he/she certainly becomes autocratic and aggressive to those without power. Similarly, Abramović signed an agreement that all people did not bear any obligation. Therefore this might be one of the reasons that law exists.





2 comments:

  1. I really agree on the direct relationship between the early feudal and military style discipline, and her self-approval and consciousness performances. But I wonder why her self-injuring behaviors can help to express her brave and what the theme behind this action is. Apart from this, she is nineteen seventies year old, which is quite far from the early stage of her life. In my point of view, Rhythm 10 is only a piece of work which reflects her complaints and helpless toward her tragic childhood. It is quite immature and promotes infantile behaviors toward the public.
    On the other hands, I have different opinion toward the Rhythm 0. The performance is quite variable and full of unexpectedness due to the uncontrolled mind of the participants and the audiences. It is relatively more interesting when comparing with using knife to injury herself. I appreciate that the performance reveals the human nature and different person would have different response. The least thing should be sacrificed as an artist.

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  2. Thanks for sharing this artist to us. People said she is the Grandma of Performance Art. I have no objection but to agree with this totally. The Rhythm 0 can say to be the most classic piece of performance art, at least a common knowledge to all performance artists. Not to mention how success her work on marking a great impact on behavioral art, I pay more interest on why she has such strong motives to complete her every single piece. What is the true force that pushes her to move to find out the answers of the questions she raised. What makes those "answer" so important that she did not mind or even willing to hurt herself physically, or even psychologically. As a female, she opened herself to every man who being an audience with nuked body, with full manipulate power given to the public. The whole 6 hours process is an experimental piece which truly reflect the ordinary nature of humans. I felt pity after reading and looking the records of Marina's work. Her tears, is the most core implication to this art performance. Not only to us, I think Rhythm 0 is also the most impressed experience to Marina, being a performance artists.

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