New Art

New Art. I decided to immerse myself. In all this time- NYC –LA-Tokyo-San Francisco- I had never been to a performance piece. I have watched Laurie Anderson on PBS before, but that’s about it. So the Kronos Quartet was collaborating in a dance performance/installation performance at the Yerba Buena Arts Center and I thought it a perfect opportunity to hear Kronos live and expose myself. Eiko and Koma, dancers from Japan, dancers of ‘delicious slow movement’ were the artists in ‘Fragile’. Their previous art installation, they performed for a month, every hour the museum was open! Lights were muted, moving, creating shadows. The staging area was tented in distressed muslin. Slits allowed the audience to peek in as they entered the venue. Huge swaths of material, kimonos, hung high on the periphery of the outer area, snapshots recounting the forty year history of the duo. Slow delicious movement in a pool of water, lots of sensual moments ground-level.

Kronos was seated in an arc around the center stage – a netted area filled with dirt and feathers. Lying in the dirt were Eiko and Koma. Were they babies nearing birth? Were they dead, waiting for resurrection? Kronos improvised sometimes, other times there were orchestrations. Interspersed were some voiceovers –the dropping of the atom bomb, references to World War II. Eiko would roll one wrist, with a slow wave whispered from her fingers. Koma’s foot might readjust. Did I mention they were naked?? They started doing this gig in the 70s, – same age as I – and I would love to look so good rolled in feathers and dirt. The performance was 4 hours long with one 20 minute intermission. Kronos’ leader said he cried when he saw their previous piece, and he wanted to be a part. Eiko said they really didn’t need music. Hmmm . . . Well, two hours was good for me. My rear end was getting sore and my hip was ready for a respite from the meditation.

The rest of the gallery was open, so I ambled through for some ‘cutting edge’ art. The art guard on the second floor said his own painting work made him a dinosaur. “Video, digital, that’s what art is about these days. And this is the best show since they opened two years ago. These guys are known. Mark Bradford, Al Gretsky.” Mark had a sculpture collage of an ark, and one side of the wall countless signs ‘Do not disturb FEMA” spray painted red. Leftovers from Katrina. Exhibition was ‘The Audience as Subject’. Gretsky had huge photographed murals of stadium crowds. Other videos – multiple takes of different countries during the Arab Spring, another video of post soccer game sport – a rave? No - young men encircling two women in an attempt to sexually assault them. Talk about a downer. The angst of being young.

I am hard pressed to think of this as art. I know the young are impassioned, disillusioned, but are there none with any hope or humanity. Such isolation. Are we so old???