Antagonism & Relational Aesthetics- By Claire Bishop

• Arts relationship to its surroundings, mainly among European art venues.
• Analyzing the "white cube" gallery space as a laboratory displaying contemporary & experimental art.
• Bishop states that: 1990's work opened up a new direction making art work interactive with people.
• No longer are art galleries displaying work-but creating a social environment
  
• Having artwork shown in a so called "laboratory" differentiates themselves from a bureaucracy collection-based museums.
• Spaces creates a buzz among people. A broader sense of creativity and the aura being present in a space where contemporary art plays a role of production.
• Artists showing/working in a "laboratory" gallery space want their viewer to "experience" creativity and studio activity.
• Some "laboratory" art spaces have bars or reading lounges!
• Hal Foster forcasted that in the mid-1900's the institution (museums) may overshadow the artwork. The bureaucratic museum becomes a spectacle-showing light on the Director/Curator.
• Bourriad believes that: " Todays artists seek only to find provisional solutions in the here and now... artists are learning to inhabit the world in a better way." (by showcasing work in a "laboratory".
• Artist Tiravanija cooks for his audience- He has observed that this involvement of the audience is the main focus point of his work: Creating a relationship with the artist and the viewer.
• Artist Gillick creates an open-endedness in which his art is the backdrop to activity. But isn't a lot of art backdrops of creativity?
• Relational art as Bourriaud argues is that : A viewer is physically present in a particular situation at a particular time-eating food, flirting, and having conversation.
  
• The presense of the audience is essential-without people, it's not art-it then becomes something that is in a room".
• Relations between the artist and the audience creates new communicative situations.
• Bourriaud's argument is that the structure of an art work produces a social relationship.
• "A democratic society is one in which relation of conflict are sustained, not erased."
• Lacan agruees that: "We have a failed structual identity and are therefore dependent on identifcation in order to proceed."
• We need to rethink our relationship to the world and to one other!

This article relates to my work because when I am showing my work I want to create an atmosphere with people, food, and drink. It is important to me that people are engaged with my work and with eachother. I want people to discuss my work and to drift in-and-out of conversation in a social setting. Personally, I do not believe that I have to cook for my audience, I don't believe that I have to prove to my audience that they support me so I should feed them. Which is not what Tiravanija's work is about, but that's how i think of it. Which it's not a bad thing at all, but it is just not "my taste." I do know that my paintings are talking with my viewer and creating conversations. That is all I need in for a show: Great conversations, wonderful art, suppior food, and lushes drinks.


Questions:

1. Where does a culture come from?
   
2. Why do we compare relationships with art & social settings?
3. Are encounters more important than the individuals who compose them?