Zones, MA, SpaceTime — Gregor Roth

I and Me Enter an Art Situation: Factors of Response

The artist utilizes tools and tactics to bring the viewer into a situation designed to confound. These are meant to tap into one’s insidedness. But there another concept of ‘insidedness’; the idea of entering the art situation itself. It carries a similarity to being ‘inside’ oneself and ‘inside’ the art, at the same time. It is yet another realm of presentness and this occurs through experience. Krisi Peltomäki asks in Situation Aesthetics, ‘The Work of Michael Asher’, “What does it mean to ‘enter’ the work, rather than ‘view’ or ‘see’ it? Entering the work implies crossing a threshold between two environments; it might even promise a passage to an altered state. In other words, ‘entering’ signifies an experience.” Think back to action and behavior, this is operational and vibrant. This altered state of perception, including the art situation, is the ‘inside’ of art - as a conceptual tactic.

How does this happen within the individual? It begins with the composition of the I and the Me natures, each a receptor and a processor, that interact and perceives; the I using time and duration; the Me employing touch and physical awareness. The I and Me are the two united, the Dual Bodily Unit, an idea that is explored later. These act as perceptual, navigational instrumentation in an attempt to ascertain their developing relationships with the art objects of the art situation. Zonal fields, then, contain sets of unique markers. There are no hard edged designations defining one field from another and each participant relates uniquely, and thereby, interprets distinctively. The theory sets out to elucidate the particular characteristics found in each zone as encountered by the Dual Bodily Unit. Again, intrinsic to the art situation is the notion of the SpaceTime participant. If the zonal fields organize and distinguish, SpaceTime fills the gaps. This might be understood by way of the following; zones radiate outward while this particular kind of SpaceTime rises upward and stretches directionally. Space rises upward. This is more analogical than actual, since we tend to sense architectural space as an openness that is around and above us. Time is directional. Again, this is more analogical than actual. In this case, time can be perceived as moving left to right, frontwards or backwards, or back and forth. It is linear but not flat. Zones radiate outward and meanders around the art object. It is not flat though, in that it rises upward, like space, and has direction, like time. So, zones are SpaceTime. And, in this SpaceTime are the behaviors of the participant’s Dual Bodily Unit, its character played out through mobility and motility. However, SpaceTime is actuated only when the participant arrives, enters and interacts. At this point one begins to sense those factors that distinguish the particulars that comprise form. These will be examined in greater detail in, Principles of Form.

Participation is wholly interactive. It is the total sum of one’s being. In one way, the participant senses the insideness of the site. Then site awareness via their physical shell, as an expression of their outsideness. So, this, then, requires the insideness of the participant to comprehend the ousideness of the art objects. This is a more natural and organic process, one suited to our make up and, I contend, offers a richer experience than traditional art viewership. How might this occur? The participant is free to proffer new vistas of negative space. These occur around any corner, from any angle, from any height, and though might be factiously fabricated are, still, actually occurring. Overlapping shapes can occur near negative space and at any viewing aspect within the installation itself, or, where the installation proper meets with structural / architectural elements of the site. This is environment, stated through insidedness, outsidedness and the Dual Bodily Unit.

An excerpt from my manuscript, “ Connection Points, Bridging the Expanse Between Self and Art Objects in SpaceTime”. (Working title.)