The example of editions used by Gillis that really encompasses my idea of mass production rather than actual editions is Jeff Koons’ Puppy, edition of 1,000 in porcelain. While I see how each edition can be valued as an individual work of art since, theoretically, each piece would be owned and made personally precious to 1,000 unique people, the fact of the matter is that every single one is aesthetically an exact copy of the next. I do not agree in all cases with Duchamp’s opinion that “one was unique, two was a pair, and three is many (mass-produced).” As long as each edition has some element of change from every other, I am okay with labeling each piece as an edition that is part of a whole series. Koons didn’t have to call his 1,000 porcelain puppies ‘mass produced cheapo moneymaking ploy’, but calling each individual piece an ‘edition’ almost seems dishonest to me, since edition implies (or ought to imply) some form or uniqueness. If it is an exact copy, it should be called simply that: a copy.
I do not think the Eva and Franco second-life rendition of Vito Acconoci’s Seedbed would fall under the category of a copy. It is not a copy because it is far from an exact rendition of Acconoci’s performance, and never can be due to the dimensional and situational barriers that surround the performances. It also cannot be considered an edition from Acconoci’s series, since it is not form his own body of work and I believe a series should be a label exclusively used to describe works by a single artists or group of artists working in collaboration with one another. Eva and Franco’s performance is best labeled as homage to Acconci’s performance and a unique enough one to be also considered an independent work, much of this uniqueness due to the aspect of it being performed in another ‘world’.
Eva and Franco are not the only artists we examined this week that take pleasure in creating art that brings the viewer to another world. Gabriel Orozco is a big fan of creating game-based (such as chess) sculptures because they allow the viewer to immerse themselves in the exclusive world of the game to leave their normal, everyday awareness behind. I believe Orozco’s want for immersion in the game world in his art stems from his enthusiasm for stimulating the viewer’s imagination to alter their view on conventional notions of reality. He does this by using normal, everyday items such as a four-way table tennis board and putting a twist on it such as adding a pond in the middle.
The disfigurines and 21st Century Bunny of Justinn Novak’s sculpture series seem to also embody this idea of taking a normal image and altering it slightly in order to create disturbance in the viewer’s perception in order to provoke new thought. I am a big fan of self-motivation and reaching the right conclusion using one’s own judgment rather than doing the right thing through being told ‘this is the way things should be’, and these are valuable qualities I would like to instill in my children if I ever adopt, or god forbid, pop one out myself. How does this relate to the techniques utilized by Orozco and Novak? I believe their technique is one of the most effective ways to provoke new thought in the viewer, rather than telling the viewer what to think (for example, painting Sarah Palin’s head with lipstick on a bulldog’s body). I do sometimes appreciate taking the straight-forward approach to creating art with a message behind it, but the technique of subtly presenting an idea in a way that provokes thought is absolutely invaluable as a way to expose people to new possibilities. This is a place that cannot be reached by simple opinion-spewing, because sometimes people are only going to see that it does not agree with their previous calculations; I appreciate that artists like Orozco and Novak seize the opportunity to use art in order to subtly provoke the viewer to use their own judgment to discover completely new ways of looking at old ideas.
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