Video Art Theory

Video Art Theory: A Comparative Approach demonstrates how video art functions on the basis of a comparative media approach, providing a crucial understanding of video as a medium in contemporary art and of the visual mediations we encounter in daily life.

• A critical investigation of the visual media and selected video artworks which contributes to the understanding of video as a medium in contemporary art
• The only study specifically devoted to theorizing the medium of video from the perspective of prominent characteristics which result from how video works deal with time, space, representation, and narrative
• The text has emerged out of the author’s own lectures and seminars on video art
• Offers a comparative approach which students find especially useful, offering new perspectives

Acknowledgments vii

Introduction 1

1 Immediacy versus Memory: Video Art in Relation to Television, Performance Art, and Home Video 20

Gillian Wearing's Trauma (2000) Juxtaposed to Joan Jonas's Vertical Roll (1972) 23

Video Art Dealing with the Constant Movements of Audio-Visual Electronic Media, and the Immediacy and Socio-Cultural Aspects of Television 25

The Appeal of Immediacy: Video in Performance Art and Performance in Video Art 45

The Application of the Mnemonic Ability of Video and the Relationship with Activist-Videos and Home Video 60

2 Immateriality versus Three-Dimensionality: Video Art as Sculpture, Installation Art, Projection, and Virtual Medium 79

Lynn Hershman's Tillie the Telerobotic Doll (1995) Juxtaposed to Andy Warhol's Outer and Inner Space
(1965) 82

Television as an Object: Sculpture or Part of Architecture 85

Spatial Video Installations and the Relationship with the Space of the Visitor 91

Projections on Spatial Positioned Screens, the Space of Sound, and Interaction with the Visitor 96

Immaterial Projections Interfering in Darkened Sites and Immersing the Viewer 104

Interacting in the Merged Physical and Digital Space 109

3 Moving Images Mediating as Contemplative Images: Video's Challenge of Photography, Drawing, and Painting 121

Kudzanai Chiurai's Iyeza (2012) Juxtaposed to Thierry Kuntzel's E´te´ – double vue (1988) 125

Video Art and Photography 130

Video Art and Drawing 140

Video Art and Painting 147

4 Repetition and Fragmentation in Narrative: Video's Appropriation and Subversion of Classical Cinema 164

Candice Breitz's Mother + Father (2005) Juxtaposed to Rodney Graham's Vexation Island (1997) and Keren Cytter's Corrections (2013) 166

Aspects of Narrative in Video Art Reacting to Hollywood Films, and Views on Compulsive Repetition 169

The Tension between Images and Verbal Language as Dialog, Voice-over, Voice-off, or Text 180

In Lieu of a Conclusion 193

Index 199

Helen Westgeest is Assistant Professor of Modern and Contemporary Art History at Leiden University, the Netherlands. Her most recent publication is Photography Theory in Historical Perspective: Case Studies from Contemporary Art (co-authored with Hilde Van Gelder, Wiley-Blackwell, 2011). Westgeest is also editor and a contributor of Take Place: Photography and Place from Multiple Perspectives (2009) and joint editor of Photography between Poetry and Politics (with Hilde Van Gelder, 2008).

Video Art Theory: A Comparative Approach demonstrates how video art functions on the basis of a comparative media approach, providing a crucial understanding of video as a medium in contemporary art and of the visual mediations we encounter in daily life.

Having a highly elusive character from the outset, video art has also evolved strongly as a form of art in the five decades of its existence. This transformation notably gave rise to exciting changes in its relationships to other media. These concerns serve as the starting point for this study. Throughout the four chapters of the book, the author demonstrates why it is impossible to capture video art in a single, all-inclusive definition. Rather than searching for medium-specificity or a general theory, this study proves that it is more useful to develop a theoretical interdisciplinary framework for research into video art. Video artworks are compared with television and performance art (with regard to immediacy); installation art (dealing with space); photography and painting (related to representation); and cinema (with importance of narrative). This methodology not only yields new perspectives, but crucially provides students with a much-needed context for understanding the evolution and paramount importance of video as a medium.