This is an exercise in developing a method, by noticing some of what you already naturally do (when asked to analyze something, in this case, the room we are in). Here, rather than just jumping into making an artwork, or an “analysis”, we are being more systematic about first defining the terms, discourses and contexts, or what I am calling frameworks (historical, psychological, personal, semiotic, etc) one could use to analyze the room they are in, then the means or metods (research in books, physical experiments, interviews, representations, measurements, etc) that one could use to gain information. This is not a definitive way to “analyze” anything, just rather a way to start.
A few examples of Artist’s “analyzing” rooms
Bruce Nauman, http://www.vdb.org/titles/stamping-studio
Hans Haacke, German Pavilion, Venice, http://farticulate.wordpress.com/2011/01/24/24-january-2011-post-hans-haacke-selected-works-interview/
http://www.dw.de/germanys-pavilion-at-the-venice-biennale-cant-escape-history/a-15123420
Carolee Schneeman, http://www.caroleeschneemann.com/uptoandincluding.html
Alvin Lucier: I Am Sitting in a Room
Our discussion went over several “frameworks” or “contexts” for analysis. We also discussed “methods” by which these frameworks could be practically “analyzed”. I am using a lot of “scare quotes” because in a way we are employing a more social science vocabulary and applying it to art. To call drawing, for instance, a method of analysis, instead of an art form, shifts its meaning. (That’s ok because that’s what we do all the time, shift meaning, make meaning, by thinking and discussing, the point is to be aware of the implications of the shift. But we can discuss that more later). In class we discussed:
Ways to analyze a room (2 parts “frameworks” and “methods”) this is an abbreviated list, we assume more and more frameworks and methods can be generated as needed.
Frameworks
–behavioural/use, how is the space used, what are its function(s)
–representation through realistic/technical/quanatative/to-scale/measured/means (such as technical drawings)
-in an expressive way (Van Gogh’s paintings of his bedroom at Arles)
–physical exploration, moving around the space (Carolee Schneeman, Lucy Gunning)
–acoustic (can be technical, or works such as Alvin Lucier’s famous “I am sitting in a room”). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCgicEWD1Nc
–phenomenolgical/experiential/sensory (very closely tied to the physical but with more emphasis on the “experiential” which can certainly come through the physical, but not only).
–historical research (when was the room built, what was its original function, etc)
–material historical/social history research (follows from the above) concerning what were the social realities that underpinned the economic factors. This can lead to considering the ideological implications (in the case of our building one might think about the place of arts in society, or location in the downtown east side of Vancouver, the “naming” of our building by Goldcorp, the mixed commercial/educational model of the building, etc).
–through gender (there are many theories about the coding of architecture in relation to gender, most obvious is the historical, traditional, patriarchal, articulation of the home and private sphere as the appropriate one for women. But of course there are other forms of more subtle and fluid codings). Here is an essay by Beatriz Colomina on the topic http://books.google.ca/books?id=4WgmIOthwa4C&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false
-cultural specificities (the organization of space and architecture is culturally specific, ways of constructing, inhabiting, an organizing rooms bear traces of cultural values)
–psychological/does the room carry certain feelings/memories/psychic connotations (think for instance of the use of rooms, bedrooms, family houses, etc etc. in horror films).
–semiotic/signs and signifiers which create meaning in a room. A semiotic framework would ask in what way aspects of the room (including any literal signage) create its meaning. In our room the bare concrete, may signify as either “institutional”, “raw”, or “unpretentious, open for the work of art”
–institutional, to use a framework of institutional analysis, or critique, one might look at how the room replicates, or instates, values of the institution
–associative, an associative mode would ask, well, what other things/rooms/ideas/words/colours/sounds can I “associate” with this space (this is more obviously a kind of artistic/poetic framework for understanding)
–archeological/discursive/this is a term from theorist Michel Foucault, a way of doing history which tries to locate how something we might take for granted, a field of practice such as “art” or “the art academy” came into being, when and how did it’s “discourse”, the conditions in which to formulate such an idea/reality/institution begin to “make sense” to people, and why.
Methods
-Research through reading primary sources, secondary sources, looking at documents
-Field Work, including interviews with a range of people involved
-visual modes including all those familiar in the arts: drawing, painting, photography, video, film,
-movement, dance
-audio (collection, reproduction)
-light, you can use light to change/show what a thing or space is
-performance (a whole range of possibilities there)
-text
-narrative (written, spoken, fictional, descriptive, etc)
-group devised responses