2002

MARINA ABRAMOVIĆ: FASHION IS LIKE A XEROX COPY OF ART

Dobrila Denegri: The early 1990s marked a change in your work: your relationship with Ulay came to an end, and you found yourself working alone again, as you had at the beginning of your career in the 1970s. You were forty years old and had to start over. You continued with performances and new works entitled “Transitory Objects”, which were created. Could you tell me how these projects came about?

Marina Abramović: “Transitory Objects” stems from the experience of crossing the Great Wall of China, my last performance with Ulay, entitled “The Lovers / The Great Wall Walk.” We began planning this work in the mid-1980s, and it was supposed to be a grand celebration of our relationship, a reunion after months of walking and a marriage according to ancient Eastern traditions. Instead, in 1988, when we performed this piece, each of us started from opposite sides of the Wall: I from the east, on the shore of the Yellow Sea, and Ulay from the west, in the Gobi Desert. We walked about 2,400 miles to say goodbye to each other. During this long journey, I noticed a particular sensitivity, a receptivity of my body to different types of soil, and I began to experiment with materials that had particular energetic values. These experiences gave rise to “Transitory Objects”, objects explicitly designed for public use, which take on the character of works of art only when they are in use, when the viewer's body is in direct contact with the object. I made them out of highly conductive materials, such as copper or iron, in the form of structures on which one could sit, lie down or stand, resting a part of the body (head, chest, stomach, genitals) on “cushions” of quartz (white and pink), hematite, obsidian, red clay and various others. In this first phase, I was also greatly influenced by ancient legends about the Wall. So different parts of my installations were named after a type of traditional Chinese meditation: “Black Dragon” corresponded to the standing position, facing the wall, “White Dragon” with the back of the head towards the wall, “Red Dragon” when sitting, and “Green Dragon” when lying down.

DD: For years, as a performer, you have been the main protagonist of your works. Now, with “Transitory Objects”, the focus has shifted to the audience, which takes on an active role. In fact, your monograph is entitled “Public Body” and mainly documents installations explicitly designed for the audience. What is your relationship with the audience?

 MA: “The Lovers” was one of the few performances I did without an audience, which has always been very important to me, especially for performances in which I often took risks and tried to push my physical and mental limits. My actions have always sought an audience to achieve an “exchange of energy”. In fact, through “Transitory Objects”, I wanted to allow the audience to share the same experience as I did during the performance. I want my audience to be active, physically and mentally involved in the enjoyment of the work, to be in a “performative” position. I firmly believe that only through real experience can one be changed, whereas this cannot fully happen when participating as a spectator in someone else's performance. So my “Transitory Objects” are not sculptures; they are objects that must provoke an experience, and once that happens, they can also be removed.

DD: You also make “Energy Clothes” – what is the function of these clothes?

MA: The use of materials is very important to me in my work. In “Transitory Objects”, I used amethyst, quartz, and various types of crystals, as well as clay and virgin hair, all materials with particular symbolic and energetic values. Now I am very interested in magnets and their influence on our bodies, that is, the mental states and states of consciousness they can provoke when in direct contact with different parts of the body. The main purpose of “Energy Clothes” is to ritualise everyday life, and they should be used in a private context, at home or even outside, so that one becomes a sort of human antenna.

DD: In the 1970s, your performances were radical and in tune with the dominant ideas and ideologies of the time. Your 1975 performance, “Art Must Be Beautiful – Artist Must Be Beautiful”, comes to mind. Do you think this statement could be interpreted differently today? 

MA: In the 1970s, I was against the idea of art and aesthetics, and the necessity for female artists to be beautiful. In fact, in the performance “Art Must Be Beautiful – Artist Must Be Beautiful”, I obsessively repeat these phrases while combing my hair. I use metal combs and, over time, perform the act faster and faster with more violence, injuring my head and face, bleeding and damaging my beautiful appearance. This was an ironic gesture that deliberately highlighted the contradiction between actions and words on two levels: the visual and the auditory. Now all this has changed. The concept of fashion has become deeply embedded in art, and so my statement can no longer be taken ironically. This is a clear example of how the meaning of a work of art evolves over time.

DD: Speaking of fashion and its profound influence on contemporary culture, I would like to ask you how you see the relationship between fashion and art today?

MA: Never before have fashion and advertising been so inspired by art, but on the other hand, there is also a negative aspect to all this; they tend to consume the ideas of art, to take the most superficial aspects of art and reproduce them in the form of clothes, magazines, a certain type of “look” that profoundly determines our way of life. I fear that this is a dangerous phenomenon because it flattens art and transforms it into a quick visual message. It's like a Xerox copy of art... 

Published in Collezioni Edge