Social Works: Performing Art, Supporting Publics

321 Pages·2011·2.198 MB·English

by  Shannon Jackson

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SOCIAL WORKS
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9 With admirable clarity and impressively rich material of concrete examples
10111 and detailed case studies, Shannon Jackson’s study outlines the tensions and
11 vectors in the very nerve centre of contemporary theorizing of theatre, art
2 and performance as “social art” or as social practice. . . . Everybody studying
experimental theatre, contemporary art and performance will gratefully rely on
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Shannon Jackson’s book.
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Hans-Thies Lehmann, Goethe-University, Germany
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6 Over the last decade many critics in the arts have struggled to find words to
describe the new interactive-participatory-relational art. Shannon Jackson, with
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her keen analysis of performative practices and deep perception of social structures
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is uniquely qualified to do so. Social Works is a game-changer, a must-read for
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scholars, students and artists alike.
20111 Tom Finkelpearl, Author of Dialogues in Public Art
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With her characteristic clarity and keenness of mind, Shannon Jackson gives shape
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to this vibrant but notoriously amorphous field we call performance studies. More
3 importantly, she compels us to grapple with performance’s internal social work.
4 Anne A. Cheng, Princeton University, USA
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Exploring the limits of what she aptly calls “aesthetic conviviality,” the “social
6 turn” in contemporary art and performance, inSocial WorksShannon Jackson
7 once again writes a vivid and clear analysis of a key aspect of performative and
8 visual cultures.Jackson interrogates this shift in practice to explore the limits of
9 art’s engagement with sociality itself—there could be no more important topic
today, nor a sharper interlocutor.Social Worksshould be required reading for
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anyone interested in how and why art can be political today.
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Amelia Jones, McGill University, USA
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3 At a time when artworld critics and curators heavily debate the social, and when
community organizers and civic activists are reconsidering the role of aesthetics
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in social reform, this book makes explicit some of the contradictions and
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competing stakes of contemporary experimental art-making.
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Social Worksis an interdisciplinary approach to the forms, goals, and histories
7 of innovative social practice in both contemporary performance and visual art.
8 Shannon Jackson uses a range of case studies and contemporary methodologies
9 to mediate between the fields of visual and performance studies. The result is a
40111 brilliant analysis that not only incorporates current political and aesthetic
discourses but also provides a practical understanding of social practice.
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21111 Shannon Jacksonis the director of the Arts Research Center at the University
of California, Berkeley, USA where she is also Professor of Rhetoric and of Theater,
Dance, and Performance Studies. Her award-winning previous publications
folio include Professing Performance(2004) and Lines of Activity(2000).

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Performing Art, Supporting Publics
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First published 2011
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
By Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
Social Works: Performing Art, Supporting Publics
© 2011 Shannon Jackson
The right of Shannon Jackson to be identified as the author
of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections
77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
Typeset in Galliard by
Florence Production Ltd, Stoodleigh, Devon, UK
Printed and bound in Great Britain by
CPI Antony Rowe, Chippenham, Wiltshire
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical,
or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying
and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Jackson, Shannon, 1967–.
Social works: performing art, supporting publics/Shannon Jackson.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Arts and society—History—20th century. 2. Arts and
society—History—21st century. 3. Arts audiences—History—
20th century. 4. Arts audiences—History—21st century.
I. Title.
NX180.S6J325 2011
700.1(cid:2)03—dc22 2010028217
ISBN: 978–0–415–48600–2 (hbk)
ISBN: 978–0–415–48601–9 (pbk)
ISBN: 978–0–203–85289–7 (ebk)
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CONTENTS
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3111 List of Figures ix
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Prologue: Pacing in Public 1
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1 Performance, Aesthetics, and Support 11
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2 Quality Time: Social Practice Debates in
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Contemporary Art 43
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3 High Maintenance: The Sanitation Aesthetics
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of Mierle Laderman Ukeles 75
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4 Staged Management: Theatricality and Institutional
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Critique 104
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5 Tech Support: Labor in the Global Theatres of
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The Builders Association and Rimini Protokoll 144
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6 Welfare Melancholia: The Public Works of
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Michael Elmgreen and Ingar Dragset 182
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7 Unfederated Theatre: Paul Chan Waiting in
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New Orleans 210
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Epilogue: Dependent Care 239
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1 Bibliography 272
21111 Index 287
folio vii

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FIGURES
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3111 1.1 Paul Ramírez Jonas, Key to the City (2010) 12
4 1.2 WochenKlausur, Intervention to Aid Drug-Addicted
5 Women (1994) 42
6 2.1 Santiago Sierra, 8 People Paid to Remain Inside
7 Cardboard Boxes (August 1999) 61
8 2.2 Touchable Stories, from Richmond—An Introduction,
9 November 2005–May 2007 64
20111 2.3 Touchable Stories, Fire Museum then and now, detail,
1 “History” 65
2 2.4 Touchable Stories, Allston (1997) 67
3 2.5 Touchable Stories, Irish Pub (Spring 2009) 69
4 2.6 Santiago Sierra, 9 Forms of 100(cid:3)100(cid:3)600 cm Each,
5 Constructed to Be Supported Perpendicular to
6 a Wall (June 2002) 71
7 3.1 Mierle Laderman Ukeles, Public Offerings: Offerings
8 exchanged via network of citywide cultural transfer,
9 from Proposal for Fresh Kills (1989–2006) 77
30111 3.2 Mierle Laderman Ukeles, Hartford Wash:
1 Washing/Tracks/Maintenance: Inside (July 22, 1973) 83
2 3.3 Mierle Laderman Ukeles, Transfer: The Maintenance
3 of the Art Object (July 20, 1973) 96
4 3.4 Mierle Laderman Ukeles, Diagram for Transfer:
5 The Maintenance of the Art Object, Mummy-case
6 Dust Painting (1973) 97
7 3.5 Mierle Laderman Ukeles, Touch Sanitation (1978–1980) 100
8 3.6 Mierle Laderman Ukeles, Social Mirror (1983) 101
9 4.1 Allan Sekula, Aerospace Folktales (1973) 111
40111 4.2 Allan Sekula, This Ain’t China: A Photonovel (1974) 112
1 4.3 Andrea Fraser, Museum Highlights: Gallery Talk (1989) 118
21111 4.4 Andrea Fraser, May I Help You? (1991) 127
folio ix