Part 2 of 6
VBS.TV hosts a 6-part interview series with Vito Acconci, revealing an art making practice impressively specific to the artist’s honed logic. I particularly enjoyed hearing Acconci describe the transition from his early “idealistic” ideas about forcing the gallery system out of business to one that included defining the “self” as working within a social system. Almost everyone transitions to these ideas as they reach their thirties, but it’s nice to hear even the biggest intellects have to go through the same maturing process as the rest of us. UPDATE: It’s been called to my attention that the softening radical stances I meant to describe in quoting Acconci above on the “self”, simultaneously provides an inaccurate and oblique characterization of all artists. This was unintended.
Regular readers probably won’t be surprised to read that I also responded to his sentiments on the slowness of the art world coming to cultural trends. In the second video, Acconci cites his own 1972 performance masturbating under a ramp in a gallery as evidence of this. “In 1965,” the artist remarks “people were fucking in the streets.”
Probably the most interesting comparison drawn appears in part six, when Acconci discusses the relationship between music and architecture: “Music and architecture make a surrounding. But also they make an ambiance. Both music and architecture allow you to do something else while listening to music, something else while in the middle of architecture. That to me is probably the key note of the 21st Century.” How 21st century indeed– art facilitating multitasking is of the highest order!
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