Debord’s idea of the seducing image being poisonous is nothing new. Plato criticized images for taking us even further from truths (Plato 2009, 29). The French philosopher Jacques Rancière takes Debord’s criticisms of the spectacle even further. For him, being a spectator is inherently a bad thing. First, viewing for Rancière is the opposite of knowing, as the spectator is held in a place of ignorance from the production of the image. Secondly, viewing is the opposite of acting as the spectator remains passive. The viewer is therefore robbed of both the capacity to know and the power to act. (Rancière 2011, 2.) This can also be taken as a critique of the Kantian experience of beauty in art as Kant held disinterestedness as the necessary condition of a pure judgement of beauty. For Kant, this experience is not based on knowledge of concepts, but merely on completely detached pleasure. (Kant 2009, 333.) For Kant, there is no knowledge or action in the experience of beauty. For Rancière, then, an aesthetic system that glorifies the contemplation of beauty in images is evil, as it prohibits the kinds of knowledge and action that lead to the formation of a true community (Ibid., 2–3). In other words, the more man contemplates the less he lives (Ibid., 6). It is
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important to note that Rancière talks about theater, but explicitly states (2011, 2) that that term includes all forms of spectacle, be it drama, dance, or performance art. Bishop (2012, 38) also further interprets Rancière to mean all kinds of art.
For Rancière, a piece of art in itself is an intermediary object or a “third term” to which both the artist and the viewer can relate (Bishop 2012, 38). In the case of participatory art, the third term is merged with the viewer so the relationship between the artist and the audience is ideally more direct. However, even in this dynamic the artist merely hands the viewer a finite amount of power. Deller gave the participants of The Battle of Orgreave some power in the confines of his artwork. Rancière notes that in a system that we would call a democracy a participant is simply filling up spaces left empty by power, whereas true participation, whatever it may be, is the invention of an “unpredictable subject” (Bishop 2011, 9). This suggests the realization of a utopian radical who is able to momentarily occupy spaces in the established system in which the radical is not necessarily welcomed.
When it comes to spaces for participation left open by power, Bishop references (2011, 7) a classic diagram called “The Ladder of Participation” from an article by Sherry Arnstein in 1969. The ladder depicts different amounts of attention paid by those in power to the everyday voice. The ladder has eight rungs, but it is divided into three main stages: nonparticipation, tokenism, and citizen power (Arnstein, 1969). The top rung is the ultimate goal: citizen control. According to Bishop (2011, 7), the diagram is a useful tool for thinking about the claims of participation by those in power. This is also true for works of art. The bottom part represents traditional non-participatory art where the viewer is left with the role of the passive spectator. It is telling that the middle part of the ladder is called “tokenism”. Participation in this stage is a mere indication of citizen power. This amount of participation has nominal value as it only symbolizes something of true value. It can be argued that this is where participatory art is located on the ladder. Participatory art only symbolizes the unpredictability of a
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subject idealized by Rancière. This is not to say that giving the participants of an artwork even a taste of genuine power is somehow bad. It is, after all, further up the ladder than pure spectatorship. Nevertheless, it is not the real thing nor the ultimate goal.
As has been stated, Rancière believes (2011, 2–3) that theater is inherently evil as it prohibits knowledge and action. Theater is the third term standing in between the artist and the viewer blocking the formation of a true community, a community of active power. This community is one that does not tolerate theatrical mediation. However, for Rancière, theater is an exemplary form of community. It encapsulates the ideal of a living community that occupies the same place and time as opposed to forms that utilize the distance of representation. (Rancière 2011, 5–6.) Rancière states (2011, 4) that what is needed, then, is a “new theater”; a theater in which those in attendance are able to glean knowledge as opposed to being merely exposed to images, but also a theater in which those in attendance are able to act as opposed to being passive voyeurs. This would essentially be a theater without spectators but with a knowing, acting community audience. The new theater would be the ultimate realm of the unpredictable subject.
Nevertheless, there is still the third term, the piece of art. Rancière grants that present-day artists do not wish to only expose their audience to images, but they wish to provide a consciousness, a feeling, or an energy of action. However, the artists always presuppose a certain cause and effect. They assume that what is being felt or acted upon is the thing they have put out there. (Rancière 2011,
14). This is the very essence of the artist-audience dynamic of the art world that also haunts participatory art and what stands in between it and its utopian goals. There is no room for the unpredictable subject in this dynamic. The ideal of the Rancièrian new theater is therefore not found in the realm of participatory art. It can be argued that the art world has its limits whereas genuine participation can have no limits.
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