Practicable; From Participation to Interaction in Contemporary Art

Critical analyses, case studies, and artist interviews examine works of art that are realized with the physical involvement of the viewer.

How are we to understand works of art that are realized with the physical involvement of the viewer? A relationship between a work of art and its audience that is rooted in an experience that is both aesthetic and physical? Today, these works often use digital technologies, but artists have created participatory works since the 1950s. In this book, critics, writers, and artists offer diverse perspectives on this kind of “practicable” art that bridges contemplation and use, discussing and documenting a wide variety of works from the last several decades. The contributors consider both works that are technologically mediated and those that are not, as long as they are characterized by a process of reciprocal exchange.

The book offers a historical frame for practicable works, discussing, among other things, the emergence and influence of cybernetics. It examines art movements and tendencies that incorporate participatory strategies; draws on the perspectives of the humanities and sciences; and investigate performance and exhibition. Finally, it presents case studies of key works by artists including and offers interviews with such leading artists and theoreticians as Claire Bishop, Thomas Hirschhorn, Matt Adams of Blast Theory, Seiko Mikami and Bruno Latour. Numerous illustrations of artists and their works accompany the text.

Contributors
Matt Adams (Blast Theory), Jean-Christophe Bailly, Samuel Bianchini, Claire Bishop, Jean-Louis Boissier, Nicolas Bourriaud, Christophe Charles, Valérie Châtelet, Jean-Pierre Cometti, Sarah Cook, Jordan Crandall, Dominique Cunin, Nathalie Delbard, Anna Dezeuze, Diedrich Diederichsen, Christophe Domino, Larisa Dryansky, Glória Ferreira, Jean-Paul Fourmentraux, Gilles Froger, Masaki Fujihata, Jean Gagnon, Katrin Gattinger, Jochen Gerz, Piero Gilardi, Véronique Goudinoux, Usman Haque, Helen Evans and Heiko Hansen (HeHe), Jeppe Hein, Thomas Hirschhorn, Marion Hohlfeldt, Pierre-Damien Huyghe, Judith Ickowicz, Eric Kluitenberg, Janet Kraynak, Bruno Latour, Christophe Leclercq, Frédérik Lesage, Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, Peter Lunenfeld, Lawrence Malstaf, Julie Martin, Seiko Mikami, Dominique Moulon, Hiroko Myokam, Ernesto Neto, Mayumi Okura, Eddie Panier, Françoise Parfait, Simon Penny, Daniel Pinkas, Chantal Pontbriand, Emanuele Quinz, Margit Rosen, Alberto Sánchez Balmisa, Frederik Schikowski, Arnd Schneider, Madeline Schwartzman, Luke Skrebowski, Vanessa Theodoropoulou, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Andrea Urlberger, Erik Verhagen, Franz Erhard Walther, Peter Weibel, Renate Wiehager, Catherine Wood, Giovanna Zapperi, Anne Zeitz, David Zerbib

Edited by Samuel Bianchini and Erik Verhagen with the collaboration of Nathalie Delbard and Larisa Dryansky.

Samuel Bianchini, an artist and researcher, is Associate Professor at the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs (EnsAD), PSL Research University Paris where he is the head of the "Reflective Interaction" Research Group of EnsadLab, the school's laboratory.

Erik Verhagen, an independent curator and an art critic, is Associate Professor of Contemporary Art History at Université de Valenciennes.

Margit Rosen is a Researcher and Curator for ZKM | Center for Art and Media Technology.

Simon Penny is Professor of Art at the Claire Trevor School of the Arts at the University of California, Irvine, teaching mechatronic art, media art history and theory, and interdisciplinary seminars interfacing contemporary cognitive science and philosophy of mind with the arts. Trained as a sculptor, he has spent much of his career building interactive art environments with custom robotic and sensor-based systems.

Anna Dezeuze, is the editor of The 'Do-it-yourself' Artwork: Participation from Fluxus to New Media and co-editor, with Julia Kelly, of Found Sculpture and Photography from Surrealism to Contemporary Art. Her writing has appeared in Oxford Art Journal, Women & Performance, Performance Research, Mute, and Art Monthly. She is a Lecturer in Art History at the Ecole Supérieure d'Art et de Design Marseille Méditerranée.

Diedrich Diederichsen is Professor of Theory, Practice, and Communication of Contemporary Art at the Academy of Fine Art in Vienna.

Peter Lunenfeld is Professor of Design Media Arts at UCLA.

Sarah Cook is a curator and researcher working at the intersection of art, digital and electronic media, and science. She is the coauthor (with Beryl Graham) of Rethinking Curating: Art After New Media (MIT Press), and in 2004 cocurated the touring exhibition, “Database Imaginary.” She is Dundee Fellow at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design, University of Dundee.

Anna Dezeuze, is the editor of The 'Do-it-yourself' Artwork: Participation from Fluxus to New Media and co-editor, with Julia Kelly, of Found Sculpture and Photography from Surrealism to Contemporary Art. Her writing has appeared in Oxford Art Journal, Women & Performance, Performance Research, Mute, and Art Monthly. She is a Lecturer in Art History at the Ecole Supérieure d'Art et de Design Marseille Méditerranée.

Catherine Wood is Curator of contemporary art/performance at Tate Modern and is currently curating, with Jessica Morgan, the upcoming exhibition, "The World as a Stage." Recently, she programmed "Theatre Pieces," a series of live works for the Tate Triennial 2006. She has regularly published articles in Afterall, Frieze, Art Monthly, and Untitled and has contributed numerous essays to exhibition catalogs.

Janet Kraynak is a New York-based art historian.

Erik Verhagen, an independent curator and an art critic, is Associate Professor of Contemporary Art History at Université de Valenciennes.

Peter Weibel is Chairman and CEO of the ZKM | Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe. With Bruno Latour, he coedited ICONOCLASH and Making Things Public as well as other ZKM volumes, including, most recently, Sound Art and Global Activism (all published by the MIT Press).

Thomas Hirschhorn (b. 1957) is a Swiss artist known for large sculptures and ambitious projects, often constructed of everyday, makeshift materials.

Bruno Latour, a philosopher and anthropologist, is the author of We Have Never Been Modern, An Inquiry into Modes of Existence, Facing Gaia, Down to Earth, and many other books. He coedited (with Peter Weibel) the previous ZKM volumes Making Things Public, ICONOCLASH, and Reset Modernity! (all published by the MIT Press).

Samuel Bianchini, an artist and researcher, is Associate Professor at the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs (EnsAD), PSL Research University Paris where he is the head of the "Reflective Interaction" Research Group of EnsadLab, the school's laboratory.

Nicolas Bourriaud was the co-director of the Palais de Tokyo in Paris and an art advisor for the Victor Pinchuk foundation in Kiev. His previous books include L'ère tertiaire, Esthétique relationnelle, and Formes de vie.

Claire Bishop is the author of Installation Art: A Critical History and a contributor to many art journals, including ArtForum, Flash Art, and October. She is a Lecturer in History of Art at the University of Warwick.