6 the gesamtkunstwerk

8/14/2019 6 the Gesamtkunstwerk

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The GesamtkunstwerkAbout the evolution of interdisciplinary

performance practices and the total work of artenvisioned by Richard Wagner.


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Richard Wagner and Modernism.

The Gesamtkunstwerk.

A short history of interdisciplinaryperformance practices.

Synaesthesia.

The brand as Gesamtkunstwerk. Creative Task.


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individual subjective experience

the sublime

the supremacy of "Nature" as asubject for art

revolutionary or radical extensionsof expression

individual liberty

:Modern Romanticism


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Modernism is a socially progressive trend ofthought. It affirms the power of human

beings to create, to improve, and to reshapetheir environment through practicalexperimentation and new technology.


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http://www.upress.umn.edu/Books/K/koss_modernism.html

spectatorship as emp abstraction

estrangement distraction
http://www.upress.umn.edu/Books/K/koss_modernism.htmlhttp://www.upress.umn.edu/Books/K/koss_modernism.html


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Gesamt- entire, total,comprehensive, complete ,

whole

Kunstwerk - artwork (usually usedto describe a grand artwork)


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The Gesamtkunstwerk is a concept,

in which the individual arts aresubordinated to a common purpose.


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If we consider the relation of modern artso far as itis truly Artto public life, we shall recognize at onceits complete inability to affect this public life in thesense of its own noblest endeavor. The reasonhereof is, that our modern art is a mere product ofCulture and has not sprung from Life itself; therefore,

being nothing but a hot-house plant, it cannot strikeroot in the natural soil, or flourish in the naturalclimate of the present. Art has become the privateproperty of an artist-caste; its taste it offers to those

alone who understandit; and for its understanding itdemands a special study, aloof from actual life, thestudy of art-learning. (Richard Wagner, The Artwork of the Future, 1949)


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Loosely associated with synesthesia,phantasmagoria, and psychedelia, the term

Gesamtkunstwerkoften stands for a an artisticenvironment or performance in which spectatorsare expertly maneuvered into dumfounded

passivity by a sinister and powerful creative force.It is often mistaken for a hazy mixture of art formsthat intoxicates those who gather in its presence,encouraging the kind of passive aesthetic response

ascribed to the spectacle culture famouslyarticulated by Guy Debord in 1968. (Juliet Koss)Source: http://www.tagesspiegel.de/zeitung/Sonderthemen%3Bart893,2613346 (Retrieved 01/03/2010)
http://www.tagesspiegel.de/zeitung/Sonderthemen;art893,2613346http://www.tagesspiegel.de/zeitung/Sonderthemen;art893,2613346


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Scholars and critics of German history and culture tend to treat such amanipulation of passivity, implicitly or explicitly, as fascist, proto-fascist, orneo-fascist, depending on the historical moment in which it occurs.

Where the modernist work is thought to aim for a bracing autonomy, forcingspectators to sit upright in their proverbial chairs to concentrate on thedifficult activity of aesthetic reception, the Gesamtkunstwerk is believed toknow no such vigilance. It is thought, instead, to let down the guardrails

between the art forms, allowing them to intermingle in a kind of vagueinterdisciplinarity that is equated with a lack of discipline.

Yet notions of artistic purity and autonomy were central to Wagner's initialformulation in 1849. In uniting the arts the Gesamtkunstwerk would alloweach to achieve its full potential, growing stronger in the struggle to defineitself against the others. By working in common, he declared, the art formseach attain the capacity to be and do the very thing which, of their own andinmost essences, they long to do and be. Each where her own capacity endscan be absorbed into the other, proving her own purity, freedom, andindependence as that which she is.The effort to unite the different art forms was thus predicated on theirindividual refinement and purification, with the purity of each dependent onthe others proximity; the Gesamtkunstwerk would simultaneously sustainand destroy the autonomy of the individual arts.


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"[...] the spectator transplantshimself upon the stage, by

means of all his visual andaural faculties."

(Richard Wagner, The Artwork of the Future, 1849)


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Immersive environments couldgive birth to a new form of

participatory, interactive,electronic theatre.


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(Randall Packer, Multimedia: From Wagner to Virtual Reality)

Tw e n tie th ce n tu ry a rtists h a veco n tin u e d th e e ffo rt to h e ig h te n th e

vie w e r's e xp e rie n ce o f a rt b y in te g ra tin gtra d itio n a lly se p a ra te d iscip lin e s in to. ,sin g le w o rks M o d e rn e x p e rie n ce m a n y

,o f th e se a rtists b e lie v e d co u ld o n ly b e

e vo ke d th ro u g h a n a rt th a t co n ta in e dw ith in itse lf th e co m p le te ra n g e o f

. " - "p e rce p tio n O ld fa sh io n e d fo rm s

,lim ite d to w o rd s o n a p a g e p a in t o n

, ,ca n v a s o r m u sic fro m a n in stru m e n tw e re co n sid e re d in a d e q u a te fo r

,cap tu rin g th e sp e e d e n e rg y an d

.co n tra d ictio n s o f co n te m p o ra ry life


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A ave Automatic Virtual Environment (betterknown by the recursive acronym CAVE) is an

immersive virtual reality environment where

, ,projectors are directed to three four five or six

- .of the walls of a room sized cube The name is alsoa reference to the allegory of the Cave in Plato's

Republicwhere a philosopher contemplates, .perception reality and illusion

:Source :// . . / /http en wikipedia org wiki Cave_Automatic_Virtual_Environment ( / / )Retrieved 02 03 2010
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cave_Automatic_Virtual_Environmenthttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cave_Automatic_Virtual_Environmenthttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cave_Automatic_Virtual_Environment


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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKL0urEdtPU&feature=channel
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKL0urEdtPU&feature=channelhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKL0urEdtPU&feature=channel


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Synesthesia [...] from the Ancient Greek (syn),"together," and (aisthsis), "sensation"is aneurologically-based condition in which stimulation of onesensory or cognitive pathway leads to automatic,involuntary experiences in a second sensory or cognitive

pathway.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synesthesia (Retrieved 02/03/2010)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synesthesiahttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synesthesia


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The (syn)aesthetic style is a contemporaryperformance practice and mode of appreciationwhich has emerged and developed in recentyears. [...] (syn)aesthetics describe both a

performance style (encompassing the artisticprocess), andthe audience receptiveexperience.

(Josephine Machon, (Syn)aesthetics and Disturbance - A Preliminary Overview)


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Synaesthetic performances fuse theaural, visual, olfactory, oral and tactile.


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A leitmotif (from the German leitmotiv,lit. "leading motif", or perhaps moreaccurately "guiding motif") is a

recurring musical theme, associatedwith a particular person, place, or idea.Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leitmotif(Retrieved 02/03/2010)
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[Synaesthetic performances] procure anexciting, complete experience that affects a

complete perception cerebral, corporealand emotional.(Josephine Machon, (Syn)aesthetics and Disturbance - A Preliminary Overview)


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(Josephine Machon, (Syn)aesthetics and Disturbance - A Preliminary Overview)

(This fusing of sense semantic )meaning making with sense( ) -sensation establishes a double edged

- /rendering of making sense sense-makingwhich is important to understanding( )the syn aesthetic strategies of

.performance and appreciation


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Transform an empty shopping space incentral Lincoln into an all-encompassing,multi-disciplinary, multi-sensory, immersive,

durational, total art-performance-event basedon a chosen theme and the idea of theGesamtkunstwerk.

You have moderate budget for technical


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You have moderate budget for technicalequipment, costumes, lights, props, furniture,decoration, music, promotion etc.

You will devise and perform yourGesamtkunstwerk as a group.

You can employ other artists and helpers on avoluntary basis.

You have rental-free access to your shoppingspace for 2 months in order to devise,rehearse and perform your event.

Your Gesamtkunstwerk should be open to thepublic for at least an entire week.

You have permission to alter your space in a waythat will reversible and acceptable for a newtenant.


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1. Find a theme, the connecting

thread and a title for your event.2. Form groups to take over certain

tasks and the responsibility forcertain elements of the event.

3. Present and discuss your ideas.

6 the gesamtkunstwerk

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