I use to identify aesthetics in art, and struggled with Narrative, Now I would like identify with Narrative, and struggle with aesthetics.
Tehching Hsieh, who is one of my most admired artist in the world, he did a few very powerful one-year performance art works from 1970s to 1990s. Like his Cage piece, which he lock himself into the cage, and live there without directing communication to outside for one year. Like his Time Clock Piece, which he punched a time clock every hour on the hour for one year. And also, the most powerful piece he did, I think, The Rope Piece, which he tied himself to another female artist with an 8-foot-long rope. In this piece, they lived together for one year without any physical contact. In his interview, he always categorized himself as an action artist, rather than performance artist. Its reasonable to understand, because all of his works is not really a performance, it’s more like a documentation for a specific time-period action. The action itself can not be performed, you can only react when things running.
I started to regularly painting when I was 7, I spent over ten years on painting before I got started to be trained as a sculptor, then I did sculpture for 4 years. Years of painting and sculpturing let me value aesthetics in art too much! For a long period, beauty form was the most important thing in my art making. But soon I found something unhappy in my process of pursuing art. I couldn’t really understand art after modern art, and the road of art in aesthetic seems has ending, the longer you trained, the better you can do. Those making me unpleasant, imagining repeating work was the most important thing in art, instead of creation and design, I can’t be into a career boring like this.
I was shocked when I first hearing about Tehching Hsieh. How amazing and cool this man treating himself for his life! And also why this man can be called artist! why his work can be categorized as art? Many questions come into my mind in the short time, and after calmed down and sorted my questions, one question remained in front of my eyes ——— how to define art.
No doubt we spend a lot of time to study art history in college education, and many teacher may probably told you what is art already. But can we define art after all those experience? I am not sure if anyone else can do this, as far as I know, I can’t. lots of my undergrads teacher in back in China told me what is art? how art looks like?what can art do? But all those information made me more confusing when I was looking and making art works, because there is always something which can’t be classified as art, but came out as art work. Or two authoritative professors’ perspective was totally opposite from each other. So I refused to easily accept any other people’s art definition, when I was junior, I was trying to define art by myself. I define art as: The process of people using the specific way to express their own idea, the idea can come from experience，values, belief, dream, etc. In my this definition, art is a process, and art is conceptual representing. But soon, after I got to graduate school, I found this definition can not contain all the art, like the art made in instant, and the occasional art, and like the art events. And when I read more stories about contemporary art, I found many of the previous contemporary artist directly fight against the exiting art definition. The range of art now was forming by generation after generation of artists’ exploration. So as I realized now, art can not be defined, any definition of art just narrowed the art boundaries.
So instead of struggling art definition, I was directly thinking about why art attracting me? What’s art mean to me? why art make me comfortable. When I was a kid, I was naughty and noisy, I can only stay in clam when I was painting. Maybe that’s why my parents always sent me to painting class in my whole child memories. I was in painting class every week from primary school to high school, continued 11 years, and stoped for one year and restarted after earthquake happened in my hometown in 2008, and then I got into an art school. I try many painting materials and skills. Indeed, be trained painting made me drawing better, and also made me stay calmly in most of my spare time. I even still feel comfortable now when I just draw anything on the paper. I can stay on painting all day long if I ignore time passing. I think I can’t run out of painting in my whole live.
Then what else? Is the aesthetics was something I was pursuing in art mostly? I can’t say no even I didn’t do aesthetic painting and sculpture for a while. Because my perspective for aesthetic now changed compared with college. From my tutor in China’s viewpoint, he think aesthetic is a feeling or sense about beauty, which can hardly been described or set a standard, can only realize after years training and enjoying beautiful things. The forms, the composition, the shapes will come out directly from your mind. And only the master of aesthetics can judge other lower people's aesthetic sense. This theory is similar like Zen in China, I am not judge this idea is right or wrong here, because they both come out from traditional oriental culture, it works good with traditional art. But obviously, it’s not working for the art emerged in decades now, especially in America. Contemporary art varies from artist to culture, the art now was not only involved aesthetic anymore, politics, philosophy, society, emotion, revolution, mystery joined art content, so many topics work with art, and they works well also. We discussed sublime, wonder, spirituality, love, poetic, etc in similar as well, for now, in my perspective, when I think about aesthetic, it’s not only involved with beauty, I would rather include the moral, sentiment, honesty, idealism, kind, etc inside of aesthetics. Because they are all the most beautiful things in the world.We pursue good, and we identify aesthetic as good, how can we abandon other good things yet? So from my viewpoint nowadays, I am the person who still pursue aesthetics, but the aesthetics are expanding much wider than I thought earlier. Pursuing the good things in my values was my idea for aesthetics now.
I met so many good things in my life, emotions, memories, values, cognition. They all made my life meaningful, that’s why I cherish my time. Action, time and space formed our daily live, if we minimizing our real life elements, the whole world can be simplified with only who, where, what time, what to do this four questions. Every people in the world use action, time and space interact with the world outside of the body.
So considering art as a way we express our conceptual, and simplified our whole human life as action, time and space. I think the way of narrative is really the way I am interested. Narrative is not like a specific category of art making for me, it’s more like a art sense. The sense of narrative is storytelling, it can either come from reality, or illusion. It’s shows to viewer as an incomplete or complete story, instead of as an visual image or a sense. Moving image is a good and easy way for narrative, cause it show different things as time goes by. People's thoughts changing when images moving, via this thoughts changing, story come out in mind by itself naturally. Without any doubts, movie, theater play, and TV show as a very popular narrative way for mass entertainment. And also contemporary artists use video, film, or animation as a moving image in there installation work, they all easier for story come out. Without moving image, still installation, painting or sculpture are also can be narrative. elements from culture, widely accepted memory, common sense can lead people associate some specific stories directed by artist. It’s also a narrative sense. Narrative is the most important way that I understand the outside word, it’s clear and can be represent simply. So I use narrative as an important way in my own studio practice.
Ok, back to Tehching Hsieh’s work, why they shock me when I first saw it —— it’s simple, but running long times. Simple rules last for one year, the meaning of this rule will go deeper and deeper. Tehching Hsieh’s works all came out as documents, documents of what he did, and how he can prove it. When the viewer saw the documents, the images of how Tehching Hsieh did it will come into mind easily. All those documents act as a story teller, telling his action in his real life. Tehching Hsieh didn’t describe, the documents did, somehow I think it makes discussing of this work into endless world. All of those mede those powerful.
So aesthetics and narrative are both the most important thing in my own studio practice. I struggled with aesthetics for a long time, because I use to treat aesthetics too narrow, it should be define as wide range of good things. Narrative as a main way I made art nowadays, it let me express my conceptual more clearly. In my studio practice, aesthetics act as my content, narrative act as my way. They can both lead my art go further.