Performance Art is a multimedia art form originating in the 1970s in which performance is the dominant mode of expression.

Performance art may incorporate such elements as:
instrumental or electronic music
song
dance
television
film
sculpture
spoken dialougue
storytelling

Performance art can be any situation that involves four basic elements: time, space, the performer's body and a relationship between performer and audience.

Where it Began:
The roots of this art lie in early 20th-century modernist experiments with mixed media, particularly in Dada performances. Some even go as far back as saying it began in the Renaissance when artists began putting on public performances.The direct antecedent of performance art, however, can be found in the happenings of the late 1950s and the 1960s. Among the most obvious differences between the two is that the later movement tends to be much less spontaneous in nature than the earlier and that happenings were almost always created by visual artists, whereas performance artists generally have more varied backgrounds, many in theater, writing, or dance. Primarily an avant-garde form, performance art is often emotional and topical, frequently dealing with political and personal matters and with issues such as race, class, and feminism. Probably the best-known contemporary American performance artist is Laurie Anderson. (The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2001-05.)

The above image is of performance artist Laurie Anderson during one of her latest performances entitles The End of the Moon.This piece combines music and stoies in an intimate setting.

Ravi Jain
Born 1971 in Stockholm Sweden
Received M.F.A 2001 from MassArt in Studio for Interrelated Media
Lives and Works in Boston

Transportation Pioneering:

"In the fall of 1999, I began seeking out opportunities to be the first to use new transportation systems, such as high-speed trains and bridges. It was only in the spring of 2000 that I realized that this “transportation pioneering” was the basis for a body of work.

Following the realization, I began assuming different personalities for each new adventure. Drawn from literary and historical sources, these personae celebrate the romance of explorations past.

In Janurary 2003, we pioneered the new tunnel connecting the Mass Pike (1-90) with the Ted Williams Tunnel. We closed that year by being the final vehicle to soar over downtown Boston on the I-93 elevated highway." (http://ravijain.org/pioneering.html)

Summary:
It is directed by the artist Ravi Jain. It is a performance piece about "three transportation pioneers" on the first ride of a high speed Amtrak Train. It is humorous, because they dress up like astronauts and wear race car helmets when they aboard the train. Everyone looks at them like they are strange, and don't share the same enthusiasm for the journey like they do. They appear on all the local news stations, and proudly talk of their heroic journey.

Is This Art?

Yes. It falls under the categories of Performance Art, New Media Art, and Conceptual Art.

What is Performance Art?
Performance Art It is live, and has no rules or boundaries. It is art if the artist intended on it being art. Actions of an individual or a group at a particular place and in a particular time constitute the work. It is a way of taking art directly to the public, without bringing it to a museum or gallery. It is often documented.

How does it fall under category of New Media Art and Conceptual Art?
It is New Media Art because it is being filmed. It is Conceptual Art because of the idea and meaning behind the journey.

What do you interpret is the meaning of this performance?
I interpret it to make a statement about the lack of excitement society has over new technological advances compared to those of the past. He used the media to sound his voice, knowing that it his information would be available to everyone.

Do you think because he used sarcasm and humor in his message, that it looses its importance? Is it harder to take performance pieces more seriously if they incorporate humor and sarcasm than if they didn't use those things or used them to a lesser degree?

How is this different from most performance pieces which occur in front of a live audience?

Do you think that this performance is more about people experiencing his piece/message and less about his own documentation?

Ravi Jain "3 Speed 2000"

Performance Art

Performance Art is a multimedia art form originating in the 1970s in which performance is the dominant mode of expression.

Performance art may incorporate such elements as:
instrumental or electronic music
song
dance
television
film
sculpture
spoken dialougue
storytelling

Performance art can be any situation that involves four basic elements: time, space, the performer's body and a relationship between performer and audience.

Where it Began:
The roots of this art lie in early 20th-century modernist experiments with mixed media, particularly in Dada performances. Some even go as far back as saying it began in the Renaissance when artists began putting on public performances.The direct antecedent of performance art, however, can be found in the happenings of the late 1950s and the 1960s. Among the most obvious differences between the two is that the later movement tends to be much less spontaneous in nature than the earlier and that happenings were almost always created by visual artists, whereas performance artists generally have more varied backgrounds, many in theater, writing, or dance. Primarily an avant-garde form, performance art is often emotional and topical, frequently dealing with political and personal matters and with issues such as race, class, and feminism. Probably the best-known contemporary American performance artist is Laurie Anderson. (The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2001-05.)

The above image is of performance artist Laurie Anderson during one of her latest performances entitles The End of the Moon.This piece combines music and stoies in an intimate setting.

Ravi Jain
Born 1971 in Stockholm Sweden
Received M.F.A 2001 from MassArt in Studio for Interrelated Media
Lives and Works in Boston

Transportation Pioneering:

"In the fall of 1999, I began seeking out opportunities to be the first to use new transportation systems, such as high-speed trains and bridges. It was only in the spring of 2000 that I realized that this “transportation pioneering” was the basis for a body of work.

Following the realization, I began assuming different personalities for each new adventure. Drawn from literary and historical sources, these personae celebrate the romance of explorations past.

In Janurary 2003, we pioneered the new tunnel connecting the Mass Pike (1-90) with the Ted Williams Tunnel. We closed that year by being the final vehicle to soar over downtown Boston on the I-93 elevated highway." (http://ravijain.org/pioneering.html)
What do yo think his message was?
-Advances in culture from what is common and comfortable to what is uncommon as far as transportation?

Do you think becuase he used sarcasm and humor in his message, that it looses its importance?

Is it harder to take performance pieces more seriously if they incorporate humor and sarcasm than if they didnt use those things or used them to a lesser degree?

What makes this new media?

How is this different from most performance pieces occur infront of a live audience?

Think about use of new media to connect to a wider span audience using already established outlets (local area news/media and national news/media).

Do you think that this performance is more about people experiencing his piece/message and less about his own documentation?

Make an idea or feeling come alive through a performance of some kind.

3 Questions on New Media Art

If internet becomes the major power behind art, does art become more transitory?

Will there be a place for traditional media in the future, and how will that affect jobs connected to traditional media...will versions of the same jobs be replaced with new media versions?

Will art in general become more electronic than traditionally based? How well will the new "new media" forms of painting and drawing and other traditional practices replace the old?

Will art become more accessable to the everyday life, to the everyday person, will everyone be considered to be an artist?

A Whole New Mind

Chapter 1-3

So far, in our reading of this book, I have learned a tremendous amount of information about my own mind and how it reacts to things. I never gave much thought to how doing what I was doing came about throughout my body. The most fascinating aspect of the first chapter for me was definitely the part about "The Real Stuff". This was so fascinating to me how each side of the brain controls different aspects of our body and makes us do certain things. I never knew that one side of the brain hears what is being said and its the other side that actually understands it in the context in which it is spoken.
The second chapter was very eye opening for me. This past year has been very enlightening for me. I moved out of my family home and into my own place and with that have taken on a lot more responsibility. I am some what of a shopaholic and because of my recent independent lifestyle I have had to cut back a lot on the more unnecessary items. Reading how so much of our country reacts on abundance. I can completely relate to being in the store and looking at plungers for my apartment and picking up the one that was reasonably priced but also good looking. Its a plunger! Why should I care what it looks like? Apparently I have fallen into the trap of consumer America. Needless to say the plunger is the worst plunger that I have ever come across. Also, from the reading in chapter 2, I have thought about a lot about how so many of our jobs can now be done in India or Asia. I had always wondered why it seemed like every time I called the service department of a tech company either about my wireless router or computer the person on the other end has always seemed to be foreign or had an Indian accent. Now I understand why.
Chapter 3 was somewhat scary to me. Reading about how much of our jobs that we have today are slowly succumbing to being done better by computers is scary. I think we are definitely starting to rely far too heavily on computers and less on our own minds. I'm sure my own father, when graduating college and applying for jobs never had to think if a computer can do his work faster. I think our society is becoming a little too high concept for our own good. It will interesting to see what the future will bring us. Reading this definitely gave me something to think about. Also in chapter 3, the idea that the MFA is taking over for the MBA is exciting for me. I had never heard or read anything about that being that case. To me, as an artist, this makes perfect sense. I think that artists in general have a creative ability that a lot of business people lack. I can remember that when I was entering college for the first time, a lot of my friends who were also thinking about art school, had issues with their parents not accepting art school as an actual school. Now more and more people are hiring people with MFA's over MBA's and realizing that having an MBA isn't the answer for everything.

Reanne Estrada Part II

I was very impressed with meeting Reanne Estrada. I thought her work was beautiful and inspiring. It is absolutely amazing how she can take something so mundane and simple such as erasers and packing tape and turn it into gorgeous artwork. I now find myself looking around me and seeing what I can make with objects that surround me day to day. I also found it very enlightening to see how many sides she has to her artistic career. She has her more personal, labor intensive, own work, and then the work she does with her group. It was nice to see an artist who has a very serious aproach to their own work, have a more light hearted body of work that they do on the side to keep the encouragement and ideas flowing. I think that this aspect of her career teaches young artists to keep open to working with others and to not get lost in their own minds.

Reanne Estrada

After researching Reanne Estrada's work I am very excited to see the pieces on the OHT Gallery site in person. The color is beautiful in her eraser drawing piece...and I am interested to see what is meant by "eraser drawing" and how it is made. Other pieces that I found from researching were made out of packaging tape. It is remarkable what she has done with such a mundane simple substance of packing tape. She really took the tape to a whole new level of such elegance. She made the packing tape look like spun sugar or glass. I am very excited to see her work first hand and meet her in person to hear her own opinion of her work and process. Hopefully I'll leave inspired to create some work of my own.