2.3 Performance art and its role in social justice movements

Performance art has become a powerful tool for social justice movements, using the artist's body and actions to confront audiences with urgent issues. From feminist pioneers to AIDS activists, performers have challenged oppression, racism, and inequality through provocative, embodied interventions.

These artists blur the lines between art and activism, staging guerrilla-style performances in public spaces to disrupt everyday life and expose injustice. By pushing boundaries and sparking controversy, they generate widespread attention and debate around critical social issues.

Performance Art for Activism

Historical Development

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• Performance art emerged in the early 20th century as an avant-garde movement that challenged traditional art forms and conventions, focusing on the body, live action, and audience participation
• Early pioneers of performance art included the Futurists, Dadaists, and Surrealists who used provocative and unconventional performances to critique bourgeois society, war, and social norms
• In the 1960s and 70s, performance art became increasingly political, with artists using their bodies and actions to address issues of race, gender, sexuality, and power, often in public spaces or guerrilla-style interventions
• Feminist artists (Carolee Schneemann, Yoko Ono, Marina Abramović) used performance to challenge patriarchal oppression and reclaim agency over their bodies and identities
• Black artists (Adrian Piper, David Hammons, Lorraine O'Grady) employed performance to confront racism, stereotypes, and the exclusion of Black voices and experiences from art institutions
• During the AIDS crisis of the 1980s and 90s, activist performance art resurged, with collectives (Gran Fury, fierce pussy) using street performances and public interventions to fight stigma and demand action from governments and society

Intersection with Other Forms of Activism

• The Guerrilla Girls, an anonymous collective of feminist artists, use performance, posters, and public interventions to expose sexism and racism in the art world and beyond, often donning gorilla masks to maintain anonymity and symbolize the "guerrilla" nature of their activism
• Guillermo Gómez-Peña and Coco Fusco presented themselves as indigenous specimens in a museum exhibit in The Couple in the Cage (1992-93), highlighting the ongoing legacies of colonialism and the exoticization of non-Western bodies and cultures
• The Yes Men, an activist duo, pose as corporate spokespeople and stage satirical performances that reveal the greed, hypocrisy, and human rights abuses of powerful institutions (WTO, Dow Chemical)
• Pussy Riot, a Russian feminist punk collective, stages unauthorized performances in public spaces (Red Square, Trump Tower) to protest authoritarianism, sexism, and the collusion of church and state, often facing arrest and imprisonment as a result
• Regina José Galindo's performances, such as Who Can Erase the Traces? (2003), in which she walked through the streets of Guatemala City, dipping her feet in a basin of human blood to protest the military's genocide of indigenous people, blur the boundaries between performance art and embodied political resistance

Characteristics of Performance Art

Embodiment and Viscerality

• Performance art is inherently embodied and visceral, using the artist's physical presence and actions to create a direct, affective connection with the audience and convey the urgency of social justice issues
• By blurring the lines between art and life, performance can disrupt everyday spaces and routines, confronting audiences with the realities of oppression, violence, and injustice that are often hidden or ignored
• Performance art often involves elements of risk, vulnerability, and endurance, with artists pushing their bodies and psyches to the limit to communicate the depth of their commitment to social change

Ephemerality and Participation

• The ephemerality and liveness of performance can create a sense of immediacy and "realness" that is harder to achieve with more mediated or commodified art forms
• Performance art's emphasis on process, improvisation, and audience interaction allows for a more dialogical and participatory approach to social justice, inviting viewers to become active agents rather than passive spectators
• The transient nature of performance art challenges traditional notions of art as a commodifiable object and emphasizes the importance of the lived experience and shared moment between artist and audience
• Performance art often incorporates elements of ritual, ceremony, and community-building, creating a sense of collective presence and solidarity around social justice issues

Effectiveness of Performance Art

Challenging Objectification and Stereotypes

• Cut Piece (1964) by Yoko Ono, in which the artist sat passively while audience members cut away her clothing, powerfully demonstrated the objectification and violence inflicted on women's bodies
• Mythic Being (1973-75) by Adrian Piper, a series of performances in which the artist donned an Afro wig and mustache to embody a Black male alter-ego, challenged viewers to confront their own racist and gendered stereotypes
• These performances confront audiences with the dehumanizing effects of objectification and stereotyping, forcing them to reckon with their own complicity in perpetuating these oppressive systems

Testing Limits and Boundaries

• In Rhythm 0 (1974), Marina Abramović invited the audience to use a range of objects, from feathers to a loaded gun, on her body however they chose, testing the limits of the artist-audience relationship and the human capacity for cruelty and compassion
• Tania Bruguera's Tatlin's Whisper #5 (2008), in which mounted police corralled and controlled the audience, viscerally evoked the experience of living under a repressive regime and the complicity of art institutions in state violence
• These performances push the boundaries of what is acceptable, safe, or comfortable, revealing the underlying power dynamics and ethical dilemmas that shape social relations and institutions

Sparking Controversy and Debate

• Dread Scott's What is the Proper Way to Display a U.S. Flag? (1988), which invited viewers to step on the American flag, ignited a national controversy around the right to dissent and the role of art in desecrating or defending national symbols
• By provoking strong emotional reactions and public outcry, these performances generate widespread attention and discussion around social justice issues, even among those who may not typically engage with art or activism
• The controversies surrounding these works also expose the limits of free speech and the ways in which certain forms of expression are policed, censored, or criminalized, particularly when they challenge dominant power structures and narratives

Performance Art and Resistance

Embodied Political Action

• Regina José Galindo's Who Can Erase the Traces? (2003), in which she walked through the streets of Guatemala City, dipping her feet in a basin of human blood to protest the military's genocide of indigenous people, powerfully merges performance art with embodied political resistance
• By using their bodies as sites of protest, intervention, and commemoration, performance artists enact a form of political action that is visceral, vulnerable, and deeply personal
• These performances challenge the separation between art and activism, asserting that creative expression and political resistance are intimately intertwined and mutually reinforcing

Subverting Power Structures

• The Yes Men's satirical performances, in which they impersonate corporate spokespeople to expose the unethical practices of powerful institutions, use humor and deception to subvert dominant power structures and narratives
• Pussy Riot's unauthorized performances in public spaces directly confront and defy the authority of the state, religious institutions, and patriarchal norms, asserting the power of feminist resistance in the face of repression
• By infiltrating, parodying, and disrupting the spaces and discourses of power, these performances reveal the absurdities, contradictions, and injustices of the status quo and imagine alternative possibilities for social and political organization

Building Solidarity and Community

• The Guerrilla Girls' collective identity and anonymous performances create a sense of shared struggle and solidarity among women artists and activists fighting against sexism and racism in the art world and beyond
• Collaborative and participatory performances, such as Gómez-Peña and Fusco's The Couple in the Cage, build empathy, understanding, and alliance across differences of race, ethnicity, and culture
• By inviting audiences to co-create the performance and engage in dialogue and reflection, these works foster a sense of community and collective responsibility for social justice issues
• The ephemeral and embodied nature of performance art creates a shared experience and memory that can serve as a basis for ongoing solidarity, activism, and resistance beyond the moment of the performance itself