Week Two Response:

As with all things, it is the prime directive of all sentient life to make room for new versions of the form, representations if you may.  As the text so eloquently states that the seventies and eighties were the decades of the ‘spectator’, the nineties was the decade of the ‘participant, so I assume that 2k is the decade of the ‘interactors.  Having no problem with this concept, I can only hope that patience will continue to be a virtue one acquires after a study in tolerance.  My meaning is that simply I also see the day when the museum becomes the producer of art, thus requiring the accreditation services similar to the work that the WGA (Writers Guild of America) provides to Hollywood filmmakers.  A new dialog will be necessary in order to protect the artist’s interests.

On another note, as technology has continued to surpass us in speed and spreading exponentially to more mediums, the founding purposes of not only the museum, but also the gallery space itself will have to be called into question in identifying reasons as to why is should not change to accommodate newer and more progressive concepts.  In the text, it mentions that, “fluidity has become a buzzword in the new millennium and is indicative of a lack of boundaries.”  This promise of innovations calls up the images of death and decay in the Roman crypts, or was it some other institution that was highlighted in “Air Guitar,” in reference to traditional academic dogma being represented as decayed corpses. 

I guess my question is with this new ‘cross fertilization’ of disciplines and the expected future ‘fluidity’ of boundaries, how will this new ‘social integration affect what was initially the reason for being of installation art, the viewer?

Allan Hill