In Seattle Washington in the bustling area of Pioneer Square tucked under art galleries and boutiques is one of the biggest tourist attractions, the Seattle Underground Tour. This historically educative and elaborate tour entertains the audience as well as giving them an insightful view on the way of life in the founding years of Old Seattle. Considering its neighboring artistic establishments, could this underground tour fall under another classification? The general contemporary definition of performance art (2) is constantly metastasizing into new dimensions. From its traditional identity of the simultaneous exhibition of painting, photography, sculpture and live performance to its new limitless realm of technological media. This underground tour offered many multifaceted dimensions alluding to the perpetually grey definition of the many multifaceted elements of performance art.
As you enter under the heavy antique doors, the conceptual possibilities of the identity of this tour are swung open. As the audience crams themselves in a small room cascading with an elaborately carved wooden bar reminiscent of an old western saloon, they sit with eyes eager and cameras read
y. Then walks in the well educated, humorous and witty tour guide eagerly armed with microphone in hand. But his identity is something to scrutinize. Is he a performer, insightful educator or both? As this tour unfolds with a humorous briefing on the history of the toilette it becomes entertaining much like performance art. On the other hand it is not nearly so far deconstructed or ludicrously abstracted like contemporary conceptual performance art can be that the average viewer would get lost in its content. An example of such is a performance clip (3) from a Japanese Design event in Tokyo.This clip is obviously at the awkward and ridiculous end of the spectrum but still is labeled as performance art not just a performance or odyssey.Further into the tour the audience is escorted on a physical journey into the depths of "Old Seattle" located a few feet below ground level. As the audience descends the creaky stairs case to a damp basement reminiscent of an oubliette with old Seattle photos covering the walls, there is a feeling of total transportation. Isn't that one of the many points of performance art, to shift the viewer’s perception by any means into another point of view? To isolate conceptual ideas of which the performance art piece is aiming to isolate?
Another performance art facet to the tour were hu
ndreds of old, broken, ridden hard and put away wet artifacts lying dormant in the abandoned corridors. These objects resemble nothing less then neglect, so much so that the patina of time on them could resemble artifacts in a mummy’s tomb. These tubs, registers, toilets and pipes all look to be the shells of objects once relied on. Much like an ancient artifact isolated and preserved in a m
useum, or even a “readymade”(1), these objects have a new existence away from the one that was originally intended for them. Generally speaking readymades “ are an everyday object placed out of its original domain into a new point of view and new thought"(1). Time and isolation took these old Seattle artifacts into another level of definition and existence and into something of their own making. These now redefined fossilized objects could very well be “ readymade” works of art in their own right. Is the tub a tub or does it establish another identity like its family member " R. Mutt”?What is the defining moment when a premeditated visual and investigative event becomes performance art or presentation? Much like the corridors of the underground, these questions become to dissolve into the dark even more. The experience is alien, enticing, perplexing and fascinating at the same time. Either way in both scenarios, questions, new discoveries and a lot of content leave the audience with a taste of the banquet but yet no real opportunity to bight into the experience due to the monumentally consuming amounts of information and surrounding stimulus. Is it performance art or an entertaining educational endeavor? In conclusion the tour was memorable, amusing, and enlightening no matter which classification it may lie.
Slide Show of Entire Tour
Works Cited:
1)Theodore Gracyk, Philospphy and the Arts. Examples of the work of Marchel Duchamp, MNstate, www.mnstate.edu, June 18, 2004
2)Shelly Esaak, Art History 101- Performance Art. New York Times Company, www.arthistory.com, 2008
3)Utube, Performance Art, 23rd Design Festa, Tokyo Japan, www.utube.com, May 29, 2006
