Art and Life

Essay # 25255

Art and Life

This paper looks at the ways in which the artists Marina Abramovic and Orlan play with the boundary between "art" and "life".

2,139 words () | 8 sources | MLA | 2002 United Kingdom

Paper Summary:

Abramovic and Orlan both present autobiographical material as their art. The paper analyzes the way they present their own lives to the public, resulting in little difference between their lives and art. The writer proves that it is possible to distinguish their art from non-art, but difficult to distinguish life from art in their cases as their art becomes their life.

From the Paper:

"The work of Marina Abramovic and French multi-media artist Orlan derives from performing art, which became very popular in the 1960s and 1970s. Performance art is a visual art in which the creative activity and skill of the artist is the central focus. Both artists challenge and question life by approaching a specific concept or problem. Abramovich calls herself the "Grandmother of Performance Art" . Critics do not dispute this fact as she embodies many people's definition of the art. Arnold Aronson believes that performance artists often try to eliminate "the boundaries between art and life and to confront the spectator directly" . In this way, Abramovic's work plays with varying degrees of audience participation. The performing art piece is often of an autobiographical nature as artists take off their masks and presented "themselves or their actions as the art work" . An important issue raised by a great deal of performance art is that of the nature of art. The artists which will be examined provoke discussions about whether their work can be called art or whether it is just life. Orlan describes her own work as 'Carnal Art". This stems from "Body Art", itself a branch of performing art, in which the artist's body becomes the canvas, the means to express their art. Orlan's carnal art takes one more extreme step using flesh as her creative expression."