Jeremy Deller, The Battle of Orgreave (still), 2001, Film, Commissioned and produced by Artangel, Tate, Photo by John Kennard.
Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster, Séance de Shadow II (bleu), 1998. Courtesy Esther Schipper, Berlin, Photo by John Kennard. |
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Institute of Contemporary Art Boston
100 Northern Avenue
617-478-3100
Boston
The World as a Stage
February 1-April 27, 2008
The World as a Stage explores the rich historical relationship between visual art and theatre. The exhibition brings together a key group of sixteen international, contemporary artists and will comprise a selection of large installations, sculptures, performances, films, participatory works and events. It will include a number of new works made especially for the exhibition.
The World as a Stage — the title inspired by one of Shakespeare's best-known monologues, "All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players" (from As You Like It )-is co-organized by the Tate Modern's Curator of Contemporary Art Jessica Morgan (former ICA Chief Curator) and Catherine Wood, Curator of Contemporary Art and Performance.
A central theme will be the extent to which a sense of theatre, or spectacle, has an impact upon the gallery visitor’s experience. Different elements of theatre — backstage, actors, props and audience — will be considered in relation to the customs of art and exhibition making — studio, gallery, artist and viewer.
The exhibition examines how a sense of theater or spectacle has had an impact on the museum experience, redefining the roles of spectator and participant. "Many of these works rearrange the familiar relationship between static art object, clearly defined gallery space, and the museum visitor," says Carole Anne Meehan, the ICA's coordinating curator of the exhibition. "By encouraging the visitor to be performer and viewer, these artists raise awareness of the theatricality of today's culture and our everyday lives, sometimes with works that invite, or even demand, viewer participation."
Some of the works included consider different elements of theater-stage, actors, props and audience-in the context of an art exhibition. The centerpiece of The World as a Stage is Rita McBride's Arena (1997), an immense sculpture that resembles stadium seating. With Sweeney Tate (2006) Mario Ybarra, Jr. recreates a Los Angeles Chinatown barbershop. This work reflects on barbershop culture and its social and cultural associations, including masculinity and urban Mexican American and African-American cultures.
Geoffrey Farmer's Hunchback Kit (2000) presents a collection of props that can be used to re-stage one of literature's most well-known stories, The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Jeremy Deller's installation and video, The Battle of Orgreave, Archive (An Injury to One is an Injury to All) (2004), tells the story of the 1984 conflict between Margaret Thatcher's government and the British National Union of Mineworkers. Deller's work takes the form of an historical re-enactment, yet many of the performance's participants were involved in the original event.
Several pieces in the exhibition incorporate the viewer into the work — whether willingly or unwittingly. Tino Sehgal's This is New (2003) consists of no actual object, but rather an exchange between admissions staff and visitors (visitors are greeted with a newspaper headline followed by the title of the work). Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster's blue room installation Séance de Shadows II (1998) transforms the visitor into an ethereal shadow cast on the gallery wall.
The 16 artists featured in The World as a Stage include Pawel Althamer (Poland), Cezary Bodzianowsky (Poland), Ulla von Brandenberg (Germany), Jeremy Deller (UK), Trisha Donnelly (U.S.), Geoffrey Farmer (Canada), Andrea Fraser (U.S.), Dominique Gonzales-Foerster (France), Jeppe Hein (Germany), Renata Lucas (Brazil), Rita McBride (U.S./Germany), Roman Ondák (Slovakia), Markus Schinwald (Germany), Tino Sehgal (Germany), Catherine Sullivan (U.S./Germany), and Mario Ybarra, Jr. (U.S.). |
