Philosophy of the Performing Arts

performance art and the performing arts 205
of performances, or (2) providing a description of an individual perform-
ance. In the first case – as with the pieces by Miles Davis, John Cage, and
Yoko Ono – it would appear that we have a performable work, appreciable
through its performances. In the second case – as with Beuys’s Coyote or
Hatoum’s The Negotiating Table – we presumably have the articulation of an
artistic content through a single performance, similar in principle to Jarrett’s
Köln Concert. What Beuys and Hatoum generated through their actions would
thus be pure performance-works, no more re-performable than Jarrett’s
work. In the case of Beuys and Hatoum, however, this is not because the per-
formance is intended to be an improvisation. Hatoum, at least, and probably
Beuys predetermined most if not all of the artistically relevant properties
of their performances (how many depends upon which properties we take
to be artistically relevant). If we treat these performances as performance-
works rather than as work-performances, it must be because they are partly
constituted by their particular occasions of performance or by the intentions
and identity of the person carrying out the performance.
Acconci’s Following Piece , however, seems to lie between these two models.
On the one hand, in line with the first model, the work is identified through
a prescription that pre-exists any performances that might conform to it. On
the other hand, in line with the second model, the context of performance
and the identity of the artist seem to be partly constitutive of the artistic
content ascribable to its single actual performance. Would it be possible for
another individual to “re-perform” Acconci’s Following Piece? Or for Acconci
himself to do so? Or would this be as misguided as attempts to re-perform
the Köln Concert?
Acconci’s piece is puzzling in another respect. In the case of Jarrett’s Köln
Concert , we noted that, if we allow the particular event in Köln to count as an
artwork, this commits us to artworks only properly appreciable on a single
given occasion. We reconciled ourselves to this possibility. But in the case of
Acconci’s performance, no opportunity was offered to potential apprecia-
tors to watch the performance as it was taking place. Our only access to the
manifest properties of his actions is through a small set of photographs that
were actually posed after the original event. (In the case of other perform-
ances by Acconci, we usually possess a video or Super 8 record of what he
did, although we may still ask as to the significance of such records to the
appreciation of the work.) Does this call into question whether Acconci was
actually performing at all? In what ways, we might ask, was he guided in his
actions by the anticipated evaluations of an intended audience?
Even more radical are some of the cited works by Young, Naumann, and
Yoko Ono. Suppose that no one has ever performed Naumann’s piece, or
Young’s piece calling for the performer to attempt to push a piano through a
wall, or Yoko Ono’s (arguably unperformable) piece that calls for following