ABOUT THIS BOOK

Bringing together contributors from dance, theater, visual studies, and art history, Perform, Repeat, Record addresses the conundrum of how live art is positioned within history. Set apart from other art forms in that it may never be performed in precisely the same way twice, ephemeral artwork exists both at the time of its staging and long after in the memories of its spectators and their testimonies, as well as in material objects, visual media, and text, all of which offer new critical possibilities. Among the artists, theorists, and historians who contributed to this volume are Marina Abramovic, Guillermo Gómez-Peña, Rebecca Schneider, Boris Groys, Jane Blocker, Carolee Schneemann, Tehching Hsieh, Orlan, Tilda Swinton, and Jean-Luc Nancy.

AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY

Amelia Jones is an art theorist, curator, and researcher. She is the author of several books, including Seeing Differently: A History and Theory of Identification and the Visual Arts. Adrian Heathfield is a writer, curator, and professor of performance and visual culture at the University of Roehampton, London. He is the author of Live: Art and Performance and Out of Now, among others.

REVIEWS

The ephemeral nature of performance art has made its inclusion in the art historical record particularly difficult. Among the many challenges is the tendency to use a single photograph to stand in for a temporal event, which unintentionally corrupts memories of the live performance. This impressive volume edited by performance art experts Jones and Heathfield features essays that articulate key concepts and challenges. Recommended.

— Choice

“One of the first scholarly texts to attempt to address how live art, as an ephemeral, often subversive, embodied act, becomes incorporated into history. . . An important kicking off point in what is a burgeoning arena of discourse.”

— Limina

“Perform, Repeat, Record offers valuable—and at times long overdue—critical perspectives on issues of historicization and documentation of performance art.”

— Drama and Performance Studies

“[A] broad and thoughtful investigation of how the history of performative art should be documented and studied….The book covers a particularly international scope, with essays devoted to performance art in the U.S., Western Europe, South America, China, the Middle East, Australia, and the Soviet Union, including a timeline of Soviet and Post-Soviet performance and another of performance historiography–that is, surveys and re-performances. The final section records eleven conversations between scholars and performance artists, including Carolee Schneemann, Tehching Hsieh, Ron Athey, Janine Antoni and Marina Abromavic…. The book will be very useful for scholars of performance and can serve as an introduction to the history and questions around the field for performance artists themselves.”

— artblog.org

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introductions

Theories and Histories

Documents

Dialogues