The practice of "play" is something which has a strong relationship with art, historically, and the projects described by the authors are very interesting.
First, the exhibition which they encountered, Contemporary Masters, at the Salt Lake Art Centre in 2010 does sound like a fascinating participatory sculptural event. The exhibition certainly presents rich grounds for discussion around the relationship between art and play.
Similarly, the author-artists’ project Playing the Spiral Jetty, in which they use the iconic earthwork by Smithson as a golf course, is a provocative action, which has the potential to generate new insights into historical modernism and contemporary art practice.
It seems to me that one of the strongest potential contributions of Playing the Spiral Jetty is to our understanding of Smithson's Spiral Jetty itself.
This iconic artwork inspires reverence and awe, and is the destination for international pilgrimages. To use Spiral Jetty as a golf course is akin to the Duchampian trick of "using a Rembrandt as an ironing board".
The tantalising video work around which this exposition is structured raises a series of questions which (for this reader at least) remain unanswered:
What transformations are made possible when an irreverent and playful action is carried out at a "secular-sacred" site such as Spiral Jetty?
How does such an action help us to transform our understanding of Smithson's work (and of large scale iconic modernist earthworks in general)?
How does such an action offer itself as a methodological case study for playful intervention in the public sphere? In other words, what role might art have for social transformation through "breaking the rules" of propriety? (A study on the cultural practices of 'transgression' could be fruitful here).
If the artists/authors were to focus on some of these questions, which are raised precisely by the act of producing/exhibiting their work, it would place Playing the Spiral Jetty at the centre of a process of artistic research.
As it is, this exposition wanders widely, touching on education, games and gender theory, without reaching a coherent destination. Perhaps like Tacita Dean's soundwork, or Nico Israel's account of searching for The Spiral Jetty, this piece of writing is a document of the process of trying to find something that remains, for now, elusive.
The practice of "play" is something which has a strong relationship with art, historically, and the projects described by the authors are very interesting.
First, the exhibition which they encountered, Contemporary Masters, at the Salt Lake Art Centre in 2010 does sound like a fascinating participatory sculptural event. The exhibition certainly presents rich grounds for discussion around the relationship between art and play.
Similarly, the author-artists’ project Playing the Spiral Jetty, in which they use the iconic earthwork by Smithson as a golf course, is a provocative action, which has the potential to generate new insights into historical modernism and contemporary art practice.
It seems to me that one of the strongest potential contributions of Playing the Spiral Jetty is to our understanding of Smithson's Spiral Jetty itself.
This iconic artwork inspires reverence and awe, and is the destination for international pilgrimages. To use Spiral Jetty as a golf course is akin to the Duchampian trick of "using a Rembrandt as an ironing board".
The tantalising video work around which this exposition is structured raises a series of questions which (for this reader at least) remain unanswered:
What transformations are made possible when an irreverent and playful action is carried out at a "secular-sacred" site such as Spiral Jetty?
How does such an action help us to transform our understanding of Smithson's work (and of large scale iconic modernist earthworks in general)?
How does such an action offer itself as a methodological case study for playful intervention in the public sphere? In other words, what role might art have for social transformation through "breaking the rules" of propriety? (A study on the cultural practices of 'transgression' could be fruitful here).
If the artists/authors were to focus on some of these questions, which are raised precisely by the act of producing/exhibiting their work, it would place Playing the Spiral Jetty at the centre of a process of artistic research.
As it is, this exposition wanders widely, touching on education, games and gender theory, without reaching a coherent destination. Perhaps like Tacita Dean's soundwork, or Nico Israel's account of searching for The Spiral Jetty, this piece of writing is a document of the process of trying to find something that remains, for now, elusive.