Disembody is a film that
reflects contemporary art.
The culture industry claims to serve consumers’ needs for entertainment as well as their needs for self-improvement. However, ultimately it simply standardizes these needs, constructing consumers' desire for what it produces.
Fine Art is a part of this industry.
Disembody is a part of this industry.
Disembody wants to construct consumer's desire for contemporary art. To try and bring this desire more closely in line with the production of contemporary art. Contemporary Art, like most modern products, is produced and distributed by a complex multinational business. Yet, the myth it presents is the face of the iconoclast, the deranged loner: Van Gogh, Picasso, Pollock, Warhol, Barney. This is the myth of Art, the aura of Art.
Disembody is a Fine Art installation, and a Fine Art documentary simultaneously. It is an attempt to re-imagine Art not as a realm of pure functionless capital nor capital free politics, but as a world of multiple possibilities; of function and nonfunction; of entertainment and statement; of individuality and collectivity; of populist and elite. It is an attempt to present an art work as rhizomatic and vibrant as entertainment, as life.
Disembody is not an attempt to overthrow or deconstruct Fine Art. In fact, it is quite the opposite, an attempt to expand the possibilities and definitions of Fine Art.
But before this can be done, the myth of Fine Art must be questioned, and the actual production of Fine Art must be exposed and celebrated.
Disembody is a project that suggests one possible model of economy within (rather than opposed to) Fine Art. It is a model that we hope will give artists more freedom and materials with which to live and produce. And audiences more room in which to see themselves and their concerns.
Fine Art is a shared practice. It is multi-valent, encompassing many people, many economies, many institutions, many practices, many skills and many venues. The story of Art is not the story of Vincent Van Gogh slipping into madness at his easel. It is the story of Matthew Barney marshaling a gallerist and collectors and crew to wring forth an epic film cycle for both museums and cinemas. It is the story of Loris Greaud converting the Palais de Tokyo into a Wonderland of sensual experiences with the help of architects, designers, contractors and engineers. It is Christoph Buchel and MassMoCA pushing art into the courtroom. It is a mashup of Walt Disney and Harry Houdini with Roger Penrose and Baron Haussmann to bring forth Erwin Wurm and Olafur Eliasson. It is a mirror we fall through in order to see something grander than ourselves.
« back to the top