Houston artists went bobbing for apples in tubs of wet plaster. If you like loopy performance art, it doesn't get any sillier.
The artists dunked their heads in a creamy clay mixture called "slip." As the clay warmed and dried, the objective was to experience the thrill of a ceramic piece baking in a kiln. But as Jay Leno says, "Where's the joke?"
Art strives to promote response: laughter, fear, embarrassment or thoughtful-ness. Admittedly, “What the F?” qualifies as a response, and at least WTF? is better than silence or a shrug. But the problem with art that relies on the WTF? factor is this: in the final analysis it panders to the lowest common denominator.
As a genre, performance art is heavily invested in WTF?.
Andy Warhol made a film titled “Sleep.” Yes, an 8-hour film of a sleeping man. Warhol, concerned that sleep was becoming obsolete, decided the film would make an important statement. And it did. If his objective was to lull his audience into deep sleep, he succeeded. Like shooting fish in a barrel. WTF?
Art – whether painting, music, comedy, dance or writing – uses a variety of devices to pull off its magic: color, shape, texture, timing, rhythm and pacing. And when these are seasoned with measured amounts of irony or contradiction, a work emerges that engages on many levels.
For an art project, I recall a classmate lay inside a coffin to experience death and burial. In his critique, our instructor noted with a straight face the project could have been more compelling if my friend "put a little more life” into it. My friend retorted he couldn't do that, because life was at cross-purposes to death.
Vincent Van Gouda, artist & critic
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