Interactive and kinetic artworks are, at some basic level, looking to connect the viewer or participant to the mindset of the artist. This mindset of course can cover just about anything, from using a work to highlight the physical performance of the human body to using a work to create a personal interaction between viewer and artist. In all cases of interactive artwork, there is no real “final” piece, like one would see with a painting or print, instead the piece itself is more of a facilitator of an idea or concept. The artwork is being used to either highlight these ideas or implant them from the mind of the artist to the mind of the viewer.
For example, when looking at the performance work of Vito Acconci it is fairly obvious that the goal of the work was not to have a “final piece” but to have a moving and possibly life-altering effect on the viewer and the artist. This concept of interactivity can be seen in Acconci’s piece Project for Pier 17 in which the artist stood at the end of a ruined pier in New York City and confessed personal information to anyone who came to see him. Of course this piece has no real total culmination, but the work forges a unique connection between artist and viewer and at the same time, this work dispels the idea of the high and mighty, outside-of-society artist by having Acconci directly engage with an audience. And what is fascinating about not only Acconci’s work like this, but also other artist-to-viewer work, is that the viewer has an immediate feedback or engagement as a result of being involved with the interactive work.
Of course not all interactive artworks take this same viewer-participation path on interactivity. On one hand an artist like Sol Lewitt saw interactivity as more of a collaboration with others – as he would give “directions” for drawings and others would draw the finished product. In this case interactivity is more about the idea of who is really making the artwork, the artist or the buyer/viewer. In a different, yet slightly similar field, the artists Christo and Jeanne Claude’s massive public art installations show interactivity as more of a sense of a whole community coming together to prepare and allow for the artwork to take place. Christo’s pieces are interactive in that they bring people together. In these two cases, interactivity spreads beyond just the artist and an individual viewer, but the work is still a vessel for communication.
However, after looking at the work of Acconci and Felix Gonzalez-Torres, whose work entails the viewer actually taking a piece of the work to add to the overall meaning, it became clear to myself that this artist-viewer relationship is an absolutely key aspect in successful interactive artworks. As such, I believe that interactive artwork works on two fronts: 1. The work allows for some form of direct viewer engagement (this could mean that they have to seek out the artist, take a portion of a larger work for themselves, or become part of a larger performance) and 2. The work itself is not necessarily a physical “thing” but an idea or, as stated earlier, a “mindset” that the artist imparts to the viewer – thereby linking the two parties.
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