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Chapter
4 ‘Ritual’ In terms of its re-presentation, the installation Ritual seems slightly more complicated than Sacrifice, which, even in its repetitive structure, as remained quite stable, whereas the former has changed significantly over time.23 This is exactly why Ritual is interesting to discuss in this context, constituting an excellent example for a work that is highly variable. There are at least two different variants of this installation: Ritual 1 and Ritual 2. Ritual 1 consists of a circle of twelve cubic monitors, showing rhythmic, repetitive T.V. images with a violent character. According to Bogers, the work started with a fascination about the amount of violence on television; he started to collect images of T.V. violence, without knowing yet in what way he could make use of them. For him, this activity was not so much related to a moral concern than to a more distanced interest in media-violence as a cultural phenomenon. That is, he was not really interested in images of actual violence one would encounter on the news, but in the type of fake violence one finds in movies and which is often staged by stuntmen. The result of this process of collecting is an installation, in which the viewer is surrounded by these images, standing inside a circle of monitors. The ticking of a clock, hanging on the wall, is synchronized with rhythm of the editing. Every second the violent action shifts from one monitor to the next, which makes the viewer turn around, following the rhythm of the clock. The violence they are confronted with mainly involved two or more people beating each other up, the knocks going like shockwaves through their bodies. In Ritual 2, the circle of twelve monitors is presented together with a couple of additional elements. It either includes a small monitor on a table or a big projection screen showing images recorded by surveillance cameras at other points elsewhere in the building. Additionally, there is a small monitor with headphones, showing rhythmic repetitions of violent actions (similar to those we see in Ritual 1)24, either with or without another monitor that goes on an off, showing instances of a random selection of different T.V. programmes. In the Stuttgart exhibition, Bogers decided to put three monitors on a table, together with all technical equipement and a surveillance camera (which was in earlier presentations recording a different space). The images of the background projection and/or monitors change according to the same time code as the images in the circle. If Ritual 1 and Ritual 2 are combined with each other, all the rhythms are synchronized to the ticking of the clock. There are however alternative ways of installing this work. At the exhibition at the Netherlands Media Art Institute Ritual was presented in the form of a circle of twelve LCD screens and a small cubic monitor on the side with the flashing images from T.V. programmes, which was attached to the wall. Other elements of Ritual 2 were not part of the presentation. Instead of being placed on the ground, the flatscreens were suspended from the ceiling at eye level, which had quite different effect than the earlier realizations. The maybe most radical change – apart from the fact that almost all additional elements of Ritual 2 were not included – was the replacement of the cubic Sony monitors by LCD screens. For the artist, the decisions made in this context were based on the possibilities the specific situation offered; the solution found here seemed to be the most suitable for this particular exhibition space. Bogers tends to think of the work as the total series of presentations; there is no singled-out “original” – even the first occurrence is always just one presentation of many. Presenting the circle of monitors together with just one additional element from Ritual 2 does not seem so questionable, then, as it merely appears as an extended version of Ritual 1 or a reduced version of Ritual 2, depending on the perspective. In relation to Ritual, the radical changes made for this exhibition therefore seem quite legitimate. Nonetheless, one could wonder whether the choice to present the work on LCD screens, for instance, did not compromise it too much. Is this radical modification still legitimate if one considers the event-structure of the work, the way it deals with the audience, its perceptual conditions? For Bogers, it almost seems, the experience of his installations is slightly more important than their specific appearance. This is of special importance, as the circle of monitors addresses the “spectator” in a confrontational way. It is rather clear why the word “spectator” has to be put in quotation marks here; the work employs strongly affective images and enhances their force by engaging in patterns of repetition that act on the spectator’s body in a quite literal way. Moreover, it directs the audience through space by determining his movement, undermining the stable viewers’ position. Beyond vision, there seems to be a sense of bodily affect involved that almost works as a sense of touch or violence. Again and again, the images enter the spectator’s body both as undirected movement and directive force. But wouldn’t this imply a hidden criterion of “aesthetic authenticity”, then? That is, a criterion based on an aesthetic experience that has to be preserved and/or recreated?25 Maybe, but this only counts for the images, the way the multiple repetitions function as events. With other words, the re-enactment of the performative process is exactly what determines the “live” quality of the work, which keeps the work “alive”.26 This does not necessarily involve the preservation of the initial technological equipment, among which the monitors as they were presented first. For Bogers, preservation sometimes implies that the work is radically changed, as old technology can create a strong feeling of nostalgia that was foreign to the work at the time it occurred for first. However, as long as Bogers is concerned, this is not necessarily a bad thing (although he generally seems to prefer adaptation to contemporary technologies), but something that has to be taken into account, as it changes the work in a rather dramatic way. Considering the type of nostalgia old T.V. images can evoke – the sense of anachronism they confer – it might not even be such a strange idea to keep the old monitors when presenting the work once again. It would be a way of presenting the work in a historical context, something one could describe as a “museal” approach, which draws a picture of a specific period in time. Furthermore, Bogers has mentioned that the cubic monitor in some works functions as a sculptural element that cannot be dismissed. For that reason, in the Stuttgart exhibition the work was presented with the old cubic monitors. Nonetheless, with respect to the events taking place in the context of Ritual, related to an experience that is determined by an affective relation between image and body, this must appear problematic, because nostalgia would possibly create a distance that is not desirable and would maybe even destroy the work. In that sense, the technological frame must remain visible as “television”, but invisible in terms of its historicity. In fact, the experience of T.V. images today is more and more bound to LCD screens, which increasingly enter people’s homes. In that respect, choosing these screens for the presentation of Ritual is a legitimate if not logical choice, as the confrontation with television violence is key to this work. Otherwise, in the course of time it might not be identified as such anymore. Speaking in a radical manner, one might even consider replacing the images with newer ones, which are more up-to-date, and, therefore, less nostalgic. Last but not least, the decision to put the work on eye level actually increases the effect it has on the audience, which experiences the images more directly in this way, as they are closer. |
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ON THE PERFORMATIVITY OF DOCUMENTATION AND PRESERVATION
OF VIDEO INSTALLATIONS |