Definition

Performance art is: the deliberate interaction between a person and object and/or other people.  The event/s can be not recorded or recorded by still or movie cameras or by written or verbal recounting by people who saw the event or heard about the event/s.

Performance art is how the artist chooses to physically involve themselves in the exhibition space and how they choose to interact with the audience and how they interact with any other media that contributes to the overall piece. 

Performance Art...

In my opinion, performance art is an act that involves the min, the body, and space. These pieces can be filmed, to document they happened, however, this is only evidence that it actually did happen. Most performance acts are very well planned out by the artist, this is where the mind comes into play. What do they want to do, why are they doing it, what is the message, how will people respond...etc, all of these things come into play. Its like painting and sculpture but your body becomes more involved with it, so sometimes if there are multiple performances they might be different (even if it is just subtle). It is all an act.

Performance Art

I think performance art is putting oneself into their art, turning themselves into a subject for art, interacting with the installation around them, occupying a space in a unique and possibly relatable way.

My Definition of Performance Art

 I think performance art is done with the body in some method. The act that is done by the artist is done with an audience in mind. It can be taped, or live. It can follow a script, be completely random, or have no speech at all just action. 

     But mostly I think performance art tries to convey a message that you can only be done with the body and action. A message that the artists feels cannot be conveyed through painting, drawing, sculpture or a photograph 

Performance Art

Performance art is the actions of an artist viewed by other people. It is when an artist creates art through a set of rules she has made for herself involving physical actions of some kind that may or may not physically involve her. What I mean by this is that the viewer may or may not see her, the viewer may unknowingly or knowingly become the artwork, and/or the piece may only include the artist and the viewer may be just that, the viewer, instead of a participant. In most cases the artist uses her body and voice to create her performance piece and includes a participant of some kind. Props, such as disguises, are also used a lot.

Performance art is expression through the usage of a particular act, whether it be physical or not. 

Definition of Performance Art

My definition of Performance Art is when the artist is the work. The artist constitutes the work. The artist comes up with the space and conceptualizes how to make everything work together. It is the viewers opinion and up to the artist as to what works with what, and why. The artist could strictly be the art piece alone or interact with objects, etc.

Defining Performance Art

You will read Kristine Stiles' introduction to performance art this week, where she catalogs a history and impetus for artists' performances. She offers the following, which outlines the genre in some respects:

The artists who began to use their bodies as the material of visual art repeatedly expressed their goal to bring art practice closer to life in order to increase the experiential immediacy of their work. Their powerful declaration of the body as form and content insisted on the primacy of human subjects over objects.

[Stiles, Kristine. "Performance Art." Theories and Documents of Contemporary Art. Eds. Stiles and Selz. University of California Press: Berkeley, 1996. 679-694.]

Consider the works we have seen so far, the readings for this week, and post your personal working definition of "performance art." Some questions you may have in mind:
-What designates performance art from live theater?
-What role, if any, does mediation play in a definition of performance? Is performance predicated on "liveness"?
-What is the relationship between "originality" and performance? Is each performance unique?
-Does a distinction between public and private have its place in a definition of performance?