Bishop, Claire - The Social Turn, Collaboration and Its Discontents-1

7/27/2019 Bishop, Claire - The Social Turn, Collaboration and Its Discontents-1

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RIGHT ABOUT NOWAr t & lheory since the 1990STHE BODYINTERAmVITYENGAGEMENTDOCUMENTARY STRATEGIESMONEYCURATING


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CLBISTHE SOTCOl1AB

AND ITS DIS"All artists are alike. They dream ofdoin9 somethin9 thcollaborative, and more real than art." - Dan GrahamSuperflex's internet TV station for elderly reshousing project (Tenantspin, 1999); Annika Erand individuals to communicate their ideas An Fair (Do You Want an Audience?, 2004); Jeremfor over twenty social organizations in San Svan Lieshout's A-Portable floating abonion cliHeeswijk's project to tum a condemned shoptural center for the residents ofVlaardingen2001-200 4); Lucy ana's workshops in Johannto teach unemployed people new fashion skitive solidarity (Nexus Architecture, 1997-presenimprovised neighborhood environment in aPark, Los Angeles (Construction Site, 2005); Pawgroup of "difficult" teenagers from Warsaw'district (including his two sons) to hang outMaastricht (Bad Kids, 200 4).The above-mentioned projects are just a samof artistic interest in collectivity, collaboratment with specific social constituencies. Alpa n these practices have had a relatively wemercial an world - collective projects are mothan works by individual artists and they arRIGHT ABOUT NOW I INTERACTIVITY I Claire Bishop I The Social


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"works" than social events, pUblications, workshops or performances - they nevertheless occupy an increasingly conspicuous presence in the public sector. The unprecedented expansion of the biennial is one factor that has certainly contributed toward this shift ,as is the new model of commissioning agencies dedicated to th eproduction of experimental engaged art in the public realm. In Oneplace AfterAnother: Site-Speci{lc Art and Locational Identity (2002), MiwonKwon argues that community-specific work takes critiques of"heavy metal" public ar t as its point of departure to address the siteas a social rather than fomal or phenomenological framework. Theintersubjective space created through these projects becomes thefocus - and medium - of artistic investigation.This expanded field of relational practices currently goes under a va-riety of names: socially engaged art, comm unity-based art, experimental communities, dialogic art, littoral art, participatory, interventionist, research-based, or collaborative art. These practices areless interested in a relational aesthetic than in the creative rewardsof collaborative activity - whether in the form of working with preexisting communities or establishing one's own inter disciplinarynetwork. Many artists now make no distinction between their workinside and outside the gallery, and even highly established andcommercially successf ul figures like Francis Alys, Pierre Huy ghe,Matthew Barney and Thomas Hirschhorn have all turned to socialcollaboration as an extension of their conceptual or sculptural practice. Although the objectives and output of these various artists andgroups vary enormously, all are linked by a belief in the empowering creativity of collective action and shared ideas.This mixed panor ama of socially collaborative work arguably formswhat avant-garde we have today: a rtists usin g social situations toproduce dematerialized, anti-market, politically engaged projectsthat carryon the Modernist call to blur art and life. For NicolasBourriaud in his book Relational Aesthetics (1998), the defining text ofrelational practice, "art is the place that produces a specific sociability, " precisely because "it tightens the spaceofrelations, unlike TV." ForGrant Kester, in another key text, Conversation Pieces: Community andCommunication in ModernArt (2004), art is uniquely placed to COunrer aworld in which "we are reduced to an atomized pseudo-communityof consumers, our sensibilities dulled by spectacle and repetition."For these and other supporters of socially engaged ar t, the creativeenergy of participatory practices re -humanize - or at least de-alienate - a society rendered numb and fragmented by the repressiveinstrumentality of capitalism. But the urgency of this political taskRIGHT ABOUT NOW I INTERACTIVITY I I The Social Turn

L 11ts critical task s ponicularlypressing

. jnBritain. where New use a rbetoric

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1. /lnangel in London. SI(QR to steer culture towardin the Netherlands and ",lic:iesof social indusion.Nouveau Commandlu.i.reJ' R.edudng an to statistical .in France are just a few information about wgetthelt come to mind. audience and "performaoce

indicators . . the governmentprioritizes social effect overUlnsiderations of artisticqu>lity.J. see: www.o


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such as a children's workshop with the Turkish painter Komet, acommunity picnic with the sculptor Erik Gongrich, and a paradefor children organized by the Tem Yapin theater group. Oda Projesiargue that they wish to open up a context for the possibility of ex-change and dialogue, motivated by a desire to integrate with theirsurroundings. They insist that they are not se tting out to improveor heal a situation - one of their project leaflets contains the slogan"exchange not change" - though they clearly see their work as gently oppositional. By working directly with their neighbors to organize workshops and events, they evidently want to produce a m orecreative and participatory social fabric. The group talks of creating"blank spaces" and "holes" in the face of an over-organized and bureaucratic society, a nd of being "mediators" between groups of people who normally do not have contact with each other.Because much of od a Projesi's work exists on the level of ar t education and community events, we can see the three artists as dynamicmembers of the community, bringing art to a wider audience. It isimportant that they are opening up the space for non-object-basedpractice in Turkey, a country whose art academies and art marketare still largely oriented toward painting and sculpture. And onemay also be pleased, as I am, that it is three women who have undertaken this task. But their conceptual gesture of reducing the authorial status to a minimum ultimately becomes inseparable fromthe community arts tradition. Evenwhen transposed to Sweden,Germany and the other countries where Oda Projesihas exhibited, there is little to distinguish their projects from other sociallyengaged practices that revolve around the predictable formulae ofworkshops, discussions, meals, film screenings and walks. Perhapsthis is because the question of aesthetic value is not valid for OdaProjesi. Whe n I interviewed the group and asked what criteria theybased their own work on, they replied that they judge it by the decisions they make about where and with whom they collaborate:dynamic and sustained relationships provide their markers of success, not aesthetic considerations. 4 Indeed, because their practice isbased on collaboration, Oda Projesi consider "the aesthetic" to be "adangerous word" that should not be brought into discussion. To methis seemed to be a curious response: if the aesthetic is dangerous,is that not all the more reason it should be interrogated?Oda Projesi's ethical approach was adopted by the Swedish curator Maria Lind in a recent essay on its work. Lind is one of the mostarticulate supporters of politicaland relational practices, an d sheundertakes he r curatorial work with a trenchant commitment toRIGHT ABOUT NOW 1 INTRACTIVITY 1 Claire Bishop I" The Social Turn

4. Claire Bishop, WhatWe Made Together,"interView with Cda Pmjesi,Untitled, Spring 2005.

s Maria Lind in: Cl.UreOOhert) (ed.). Contemporary,\/I: FromStwlio tDSituation(LOndon: Black DogpUblishing , 2004).6 For example , Lucy Lippard, concluding her boOk1litwre o( the Local(199]), presents an eight point "ethic of place" for .nists who work with communities. Crant Kester'sc",,,,,,,rion Pi",,, (2004),while lucidly articulatingmany of the problemsassociatedwith suchpractices. neverthelessadvocates an 4It. of concrete

) interventions in which themist does not occupy aposition of pedagogical orcreativem;!.lltery.lnCoodJnlentions:judying th'Arto(

I Encowuer (Amsterdam: FondsBKVB, 2005), the Dutchcritic Erik H.goort axguesthat we must not shy frommaking moral judgmentsan this.ut.: we mustweigb up the presentationand representation ofan.mist'S good intentions,"

the social. In her essay on Oda Projesi, she nnot interested in showing or exhibiting art bmeans for creating and recreating new relatiShe discusses the collective's project in Riemwhich the group collaborated with a local Torganize a tea party, guided tours led by theing and Tuppetware parties, and the installpaper that people wrote and drew on to stimLind compares this endeavor to Thomas Hirment, his well-known collaboration with a mnity in Kassel for Documenta 11 (2002). Lind obcontrary to Thomas Hirschhorn, are the betequal status they give to their collaboratorsis to create art. For the Bataille Monument heand in part also executed, a pla n on whichment. His participants were paid for theirthat of the executor' and not'co-creator.''' Lthat Hirschhorn's work, by using participagenre of the monument, was rightly criticmaking exotic marginalized groups and thform of a social pornography." By contrast,"work with groups of people in their immeallow them to wield great influence on theIt is worth looking closely at Lind's criteriabased on an ethics of authorial renunc iatisi is better than that of Thomas Hirsc hhorsuperior model of collaborative practice. Tartistic significance of the respective projof a judgment on the artists' relationshipHirschhorn's (purportedly) exploitative renegatively to Oda projesi's inclusive generLind downplays what might be interestingart _ the possible achievement of making significance of dematerializing a project iher criticism is dominated by ethical judgdure and intentionality.Similar examples can be found in the wr iEriksson and many other artists workingtradition. It finds support in most of thethat collaborates with "real" people (that not the arti st's friends or other artists)." RIGHT ABOUT NOH 1 INTERACTIVITY 1 Claire Bishop 1 The So62 63


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rial intentionality (ora humble lack thereof) is privileged over adiscussion of the work's conceptual significance as a social and aesthetic form. Paradoxically, this leads to a situati on in which notonly collectives but also individual artists are praised for thei r authorial renunciation. And this may explain, to some degree, whysocially engaged art has been largely exempt from art criticism:emphasis is shifted away from the disruptive specificity of a givenwork and onto a generalized set of moral precepts.In his book Conversation Pieces (2004), Grant Kester argues that consultative and "dialogic art" art necessitates a shift in our understanding of what ar t is - away from the visualand sensory (whichare individual experiences) and toward "discursive exchange an dnegotiation." He challenges us to treat communication as an aesthetic form but ultimately he fails to defend this and seems perfectly conten t to allow that a socially collaborative art project couldbe deemed a success if it works on the level of social interventi oneven though it founders on the level of art. In the absence of acommitment to the aesthetic, Kester's position adds up to a familiar summary of the intellectual trends inaugurated by identitypolitics: respect for the othe r, recognition of difference, protection of fundamental liberties and an inflexible mode of politicalcorrectness. As such, it also constitutes a rejection of any art thatmight offend or trouble its audience - most notably the historicalavant-garde, within whose lineage Kester nevertheless wishes tosituate social-engagement as a radical practice. He criticizes Dadaand surrealism, which sought to "shock" viewers into being moresensitive and receptive to the world, .because they assume that theartist is a privileged bearer of insights. I would argue that such discomfort and frustration - along with absurdity, eccentricity, doubtor sheer pleasure - can, on the contrary, be crucial elements of awork's aesthetic impact and are essential to gainin g new perspectives on our condition. The best examples of socially collaborativeart give rise to these - and many other - effects, which must be readalongside more legible intention s, such as t he recovery of a fantasmatic social bond or the sacrifice of authorship in the name of a"true" and respectful collaboration. Some of these projects are wellknown: Thomas Hirschhorn's Musee Precaire (2004) and 24h Foucault(2004), Aleksandra Mir's Cinema for the Unemployed (199B), Francis Alys'When Faith Moves Mountains (2003). Rather than positioning them-selves within an activist lineage in which art is marshaled to socialchange, these artists have a closer relationship to avant-garde theater, performance or even architectural theory. As a consequence,

perhaps, they attempt to think the aesthetictogether, rather than subsuming both withinThe British artist phil Collins fully integratesin his work. Invited to undertake a residenccided to hold a disco-dancing maratho n forwhich he recorded to produce the two-chann(2004). Collins paid nine teenagers to dancehours, on two consecutive days, in front of an unrelentingly cheesy compilation of popmesmerizing and irresistible as they move fing to exhaustion. The sound track's b anal pand rejection acquire poignant connotationdouble endurance of the marathon and of thcal crisis in which they are trapped. It goes shoot Horses is a perverse representation of thwas invited to respond to: the Occupied Terexplicitly, bu t are ever-present as a frame. Thas a political purpose: Collins' decision to as generic globalized teenagers becomes clepuzzled questions regularly overheard whepublic: How come Palestinians know Beyonwearing Nikes? By voiding the work of direCollins demonstrates how swiftly this spacegenerated by the media's selective productiof images from th e Middle East. By using pPalestinian as to Western teens, Collins alson globalization that is considerably more ist-oriented political art. They shoot Horses plof benevolent socially collaborative practicetive for its participants and reinforces a socthis with the visual and conceptual convenpresentation of the work as a two-screen ineight-hour working day subverts both genrseduction on the one hand and grueling duThe work of Polish artistAr tur Zmijewski, lten revolves around the devising and recorsometimes even excruciating, situations. ISinging Lesson I (2001), a group of deaf studenMaklakiewicz's1944 Polish Mass in a Warsshot is staggeringly hard: an image of the gant neoclassical symmetry, is offset by thvoice of a young girl. She is surrounded by

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unable to hear her effons, chat with one another in sign language.Zmijewski's editing draws constant attention to the contrast between the choir and their environment, suggesting that religiousparadigms of perfection continue to inform our ideas of beauty.A second version of TheSin9in9 Lesson was filmed in Leipzig in 2002.This time the deaf students, together with a professional chorister,sing a Bach cantata to the accompaniment of a baroque chamber orchestra, in a church where Bach once served as cantor. The Germanversion is edited to reveal a more pl ayful side of the experiment.Some students take the task of performing seriously; others abandon it in laughter. Their gestures of sign language in rehearsal areechoed by those of the conductor: two visual languages that serveto equate th e two types of music produced by Zmijewski 's experiment - the harmonies of the orchestra and the strained wailing ofthe choir. The anist's stylized editing, compounded by my inabilityto understand sign language, seem integral to the film's point: wecan only ever have limited access to others' emotional and social experiences, and the opacity of this knowledge obstructs any analysisfounded on such assumptions. Instead we are invited to read whatis presented to us - a perverse assemblage of conductor, musiciansand deaf choir that produces something more complex, troublingan d multi-layered than the release of individual creativity.It will be protested that both Collins and Zmijewski produce videosfor consumption within a gallery, as if the space outside it wereautomatically more authentic - a logic that has been definitivelyunraveled by Kwon in One PlaceAfterAnother . Her advocacy of an that"unworks" community might usefully be applied to the practice ofBritish artist Jeremy Deller. In 2001 he organized the re-enactmentof a key event from the English miners' strike of 1984 - a violentclash between miners and the police in the village of Orgreave inYorkshire. The Battle ofOr9reave was a one-day re-enactment of this

.clash, performed by former miners and policemen together witha number of historical re-enactment societies. Although the workseemed to contain a twisted therapeutic element (in that both miners and police involved in the struggle were involved, some of themswappin g roles), TheBattleofOr9reave did not seem to heal a wound somuch as to reopen it. Deller's event was both politically legible andutterly pointless: it summoned the experiential potency of a political demonstration, but only to expose a wrong seventeen years toolate. It gathered the people together to remember and replay a disastrous event, but this remembrance took place in circumstancesmore akin to a village fair, with a brass band, food stalls andRIGHT ABOUT HOW I INTERACTIVITY I Claire Bishop I The Social Turn 66

children running around . This contrast is th e only video documentation of The Battlepart of a feature-l ength film by Mike Figgiwho explicitly uses the work as a vehicle fThatcher government . Clips of Deller's eveemotional interviews with former minersdisconcerting. The involvement of historicties is integral to this ambiguity, since thcally elevated the relatively recent events aof English history, while drawing attentioactivity in which bloody battles are enthua social and aesthetic diversion. The wholstood as contemporary history painting ttion and reality.Deller, Collins and Zmijewski do not makchoice, they do not embrace the Christi aninstead, they act on their desire without ttions of guilt. In so doing, their work joinauthored situations that fuse social realitlated artifice. This tradition still needs to perhaps, with the "Dada-Season" in the smanifestations that sought to involve th esalient of these events was an "excursion"Julien Ie Pauvre, which drew more than othe pouring rain. The inclement weatherprevented an "auction of abstractions" froDada excursion, as in the examples givenrelations were not an end in themselves,a more complex knot of concerns about pment and th e conventions of social interaThe discursive criteria of socially engagedfrom a tacit analogy between anti-capital"good soul." In this schema, self-sacrificeist should renounce authorial presence inticipants to speak through him or her. Thpanied by the idea that an should extractdomain of th e aesthetic an d be fused witFrench philos opher Jacques Ranciere hasof th e aesthetic ignores the fact that thestand it in the West - the "aesthetic regimSchiller and the Romantics and still opercated precisely on a confusion between a

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at one remove from instr umenta l rationality) and heteronomy (itsblurring of art and life).'Untangling this knot - or ignoring it byseeking more concrete ends for art - is slightly to miss the point,since the aesthetic is, according to Ranciere, the ability to thinkcontradiction: the productive c ontradiction of art's relationshipto social change, characterized precisely by that tension betweenfaith in art's autonomy and belief in art as inextricably bound tothe promise of a bette r world to come. For Ranciere, the aestheticdoes not need to be sacrificed at the altar of social change, as it already inherently contains this ameliorative promise. The best artmanages to fulfill the promise of the antinomy w hich Schiller sawas the very root of aesthetic experience and not surrender itself toexemplary (but relatively ineffectual) gestures. The best collaborative practices of the last ten years address this contradictory pullbetween autonomy and social interventi on and reflect on this antinomy, both in the structure of the work and in the conditions ofits reception. It is to this art - however uncomfortable, exploitative,or confusing it may first appear - that we must tu m for an alternative to the well-intentioned homilies that today pass for critical discourse on social collaboration. 7 Jacques R m d ~ " , . '"!he

Aesthetic Revolution andIts Outcomes," in: Navuft REIri

Bishop, Claire - The Social Turn, Collaboration and Its Discontents-1

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