Discussion of Performance Reading by Kristine Stiles

Kristine Stiles utilized her platform in chapter six of Critical Terms for Art History to explain complexities involved in performance that rendered it impossible to be understood through traditional art-historical methods, in addition to examining her theory of performance as a potentially critical avenue for political and social change.

Stiles presents the theory that performance provides a “transpersonal visual aesthetic,” which essential alludes to the relationship between the subject and object and the relationship between artists and viewers. (p 76) Performance is not simply a presentation of the artist or representation of the artist’s identity and opinions, nor is it a discontinuous, disassociation between artist and viewer or artist and object. It is, however, an “interstitial continuum” that ultimately describes the connection of subjects, the artist, artwork, discourse surrounding the performance, and the audience. (p 76) As the performer commands the roles of subject and object, the performance comments on the act that is simultaneously being acted out and provides an explicit opportunity for connection and exchange. (p 83 and 95) The disconnect that is often present is traditional art is eliminated as the connection from the actual physical form of the artist through the inclusion of the viewer in the performance is created. Thus, multiple elements are connected through the “commissure” the performance provides. (p 77)

In addition to examining defining characteristics of performance, Stiles explains and reiterates the social and political aspects of performance art. She argues that not only are social and political ideas prevalent throughout performance, they are a central factor. Essentially, the connection performance provides where “intentionality, presentation and representation, and the complex content of interpretation” intersect, create an inherent platform for social and political meaning to occur. (p 95) Stiles admits that art commenting on and influencing social and political issues was not original to performance. Yet the use of the performer’s body as material was much more prevalent beginning in the 1950s, which more so distinguishes contemporary performance from avant-garde. Overall, she identifies and argues the involvement performance plays and has played in social and political movements and explains the social and political effectiveness of performance with numerous examples. (p 93)

Stiles provided a concrete example of RoseLee Goldberg’s statement in Performance Art: From Futurism to the Present, “By it’s very nature, performance defies precise or easy definition beyond the simple declaration that it is live art by artists.” (p 9) The complicated nature in which Stiles defined and explained performance supports the idea that there is not a definitive, simplistic form in which to explain performance, which speaks to it’s inability to be confined by and analyzed by traditional art-historical methods.