[The "square" of artwork] "The square is a sanctuary of trust and care, and within it, we share the same rights and obligations", in the square in front of the art museum, a worker spent one night cutting the ground and embedded a strip of The light strip, a perfect square is ready, and then attach a metal plate with a declaration engraved. This is a piece of art, even a piece of art that is to be displayed and planned separately.
We have seen many works of art like this, the form is simple and elegant, the declaration is politically correct, and it is impeccable. Facing such a work, the curator's attitude is, "its strength lies in the simplicity of its form", a work of art that can be justified, this is the logic of the art museum, but this is only the logic of the art museum. The success of a piece of art lies in whether it can wake people up from their daily logic and realize other possibilities rooted in human nature. Will this "square" be successful in this sense?
[Artwork "You Have Nothing"] A more common scene. In the huge space, dozens of small mounds are neatly lined up. On the wall is written "you have nothing", and works in the same format as "square": objects with a sense of form, and a sentence is thrown into your face. You can't argue with the judgment word, and there is no room for dialogue with it. The two visitors to the exhibition just discussed the basic information of the artist, looked at it with a probe and walked away. It can be said that this modern artwork is a complete failure at this moment.
[The "Angry Gorilla" Performance Art of Artwork] Its appearance is very unique. Following the contrasting look and feel created by "nothing at all", the librarians guide the tourists on a daily basis, as if they are familiar with the monotonous and repetitive guidance work, the background sound It was the gorillas who were screaming, but the tourists who didn't respond were helpless... This lifeless art gallery.
The embarrassing and polite interviews of the opening curator and the female reporter have in common with the entire art museum, which is a kind of performativeness, establishing an identity for oneself, and then trying to make oneself seem to conform to it. This kind of setting and catering itself is a kind of restriction on people and art, such as the symbol of "square", when we try to make our apparent identity distinctly different/higher than others, this itself is the beginning of the separation, right The consciousness of self "identity" becomes symbolic and formalized in the relationship between people and people. A concise identity setting can only be an idealized source of security, and it seems thin and untrustworthy compared with a life that is rich and sometimes out of control and derailed. When the female reporter asked the curator an obscure theoretical point of view with a look-up attitude, the curator after a night of revelry hesitated and tried to recall the appearance of the curator, is it also a bit "unprofessional"? Therefore, the film unfolds the following content in this deviation between reality and assumption, and continues this unspeakable and implicit embarrassing atmosphere, or a kind of irony.
【Theatrical scene and ironic rhetoric】
There are several typical scenes of "identity" in the film, and each of them can be regarded as a stage. They are often public spaces, or occasions where many people gather, but each time it ends with the scene getting out of control. In the filming scene of the interview between the curator and the female reporter, the curator's response and the long circuitous theoretical language itself made the "frame" of the art museum, a holy place, questionable.
In a similar scenario 2, the curator rehearsed the speech alone in the bathroom with the manuscript and designed a meme, deliberately blurring his curator's theoretical right to speak, and pretending to easily adjust the rhythm and atmosphere of the speech, the performance-style scene again. is emphasized. And the audience is also cooperating with him in acting. When the chefs came to introduce the menu, they rudely left the venue one after another, and the "frame" of this seemingly democratic and equal temporary small group also collapsed instantly.
The third scene is at the gala dinner in the art museum. A group of decent people are forced to bear by a "gorilla". They finally unload the burden of their identities, end the performance , pick up the most primitive weapons, and mingle with their fists and feet. The "box" is also broken.
Broken frames again and again appear frequently in everyone's private life scenes.
The debate over "who will deliver the threatening letter" instantly collapsed the fragile alliance between the curator and the young librarians. The seemingly enthusiastic help was just a farce to vent on the subject. The poor curator was alone in danger Entering a residential building in a slum area, he has already symbolized the people in this place in his mind, a group of difficult and uneducated poor people, disgusting and terrible. While he was cursing and stuffing letters, the status of a decent art curator had become a joke, and another frame was broken.
One-night stands for condoms, 711's contemptuous attitude towards rude beggars, cowardly too cowardly to get a second reply in person, swearing at a child on the stairs of one's own house, or even violently shooting, in the plot set by these directors, a decent The moral bottom line of the power holders is so fragile.
The style of this film, compared with other documentary style films, is deliberately set by the director to set the stark irony of the story, the dramatic effect of the single-act scenes, and the daily embarrassing performance of the characters in the film who are trapped in modern difficulties. combine.
When mutual responsibility and caring become self-evident obligations under social citizenship, some people use it to create untrue lies and topics. The truth is gradually buried in the ups and downs of discourse, losing credibility, losing the spontaneous attention of the public, and indifference. , Hypocrisy gradually spread to all social life, the more people are in public places, the more they are like puppets without sincerity. Trapped under the protection of identity, power, and class separation, people are familiar with the performance methods in various occasions, which has become a necessary survival skill in a contract society. Nor has it been nearer. But how many people can consciously maintain judgment in such an environment, look directly at the obstacles and difficulties, and spontaneously reflect on the deep-rooted selfishness and prejudice? '
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