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Fraser: Bridging the Gaps

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The Museum Highlights selections really opened my eyes to the art world and its boundaries.  Many people, myself included, fail to realize how divisive the arts have become at the hand of professionalism and academia.  This is extremely important to note and I believe that groups like Kontext Kunst and artists like Andrea Fraser that dedicate themselves to bridging the gaps between writing, thinking, and making presented in the art world are admirable.  Fraser is able to do this through the interconnectedness of her writing, and performances.

One thing that stood out to me about Frasers project art is the way in which it critiques aspects of the culture of art oftentimes simply through representation.  Understanding these cultural tendencies is something that I came to learn through Fraser’s work.  For example, while reading chapter 9 of a performance where Jane Castleton leads a tour group through the Philadelphia Museum of Art, it became undoubtedly apparent to me who and what the Museum deemed important, as well as what type of people the Museum preferred and catered to.  Fraser sums up this notion beautifully in her description of Jane in the end notes where she states:

“as a volunteer, she expresses the possession of a quantity of the leisure and the economic and cultural capital that defines a museum’s patron class.  It is only a small quantity – indicating rather than bridging the class gap that compels her to volunteer her services in the absence of capital…yet it is enough to position her in identification with the museum’s board of trustees and as the museum’s exemplary viewer” (Fraser, 110)

Fraser:  Through the interconnectedness of her writing and performances, Fraser attempts to bridge the division between ‘writing’, ‘thinking’, and ‘making’ that the professionalization of the artist and intellectual created.

Taylor:  Taylor outlines the history of performance art and highlights artists significant to the genre including Abramovic, and Scheemann.

Exclusive Museums

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Taylor: “Performance Art” explores the work of visual artists, such as Carolee Schneemann and Chris Burden.

Fraser: Andrea Fraser critiques the exclusionary practices of museum institutions by revealing their bias towards the white, middle class audience.

I was fascinated by Andrea Fraser’s construction of self as an “insider” while serving as docent, Jane Castleton. As an insider, a person who represents the values of the museum and is a “figure of identification for the primarily white, middle-class audience,” the docent’s identity excludes members who may identify with another race or class. Fraser’s mention of “culture-speak,” jargon used by docents, also alienates “outsiders” and those that are unfamiliar with the language. This theme of self and other is present in Fraser’s performance with the separation of the outsider from the insider. Similar to our past readings of how art excludes spectators that do not identify with the narrative of the artist or the subject of portrayal, the museum tour performance does the same by outcasting “others” who are not members of the white, middle class community.

An interesting aspect of the reading was Fraser’s reference to the Museum Shop and the opportunity to change the name of the shop for $750,000. This mention of opportunity and the docent’s suggestion to the audience to purchase a museum membership may give visitors a sense of unwelcome and create guilt because of their inability to afford such luxuries. From the jargon of the docent to the European exhibits of the museum, it is obvious that it is an institution that forces the public to “raise their standards of taste” if it wants to appreciate the values of the museum. Overall, Fraser does an excellent job of using her artistic production via museum tours and fictional character to challenge the historical practices of museums that do not represent the identity of the local community.