1.
“…a
de-­‐authored
lineage…”1
By:
Cecily
Hughes
1
Bishop
2006

2.
Disclaimer
(?):
The
following
essay
is
an
exercise
in
pastiche
and
plagiarism.
None
of
the
words
contained
therein
are
written
by
me.
However,
it
is
my
‘original’
creation
–
one
that
I
claim
authorship
over.
The
concept
for
this
work
came
out
of
ideas
put
forwarded
in
many
texts
on
adaptation,
appropriation,
collage,
montage,
and
parody,
but
draws
specifically
on
the
critical
validity
of
pastiche
and
plagiarism
put
forth
by
writers
Sarah
Smith
and
Gregory
Ulmer.
This
essay
is
not
a
‘cop-­‐out’,
a
lazy
pastiche
too
dull
to
achieve
the
status
of
parody,
but
a
critical
text
which
aims
to
analyze
and
critique
authorship
in
participatory
art
practices,
using
Claire
Bishop
edited
collection
of
essays,
Participation,
as
its
core
text
.
"The
selection
of
texts...is
not
itself
random
but…a
major
part
of
the
critical
statement."
(Ulmer
2002
)
At
times,
I
found
this
project
incredibly
challenging.
First
of
all,
as
teeth-­‐grindingly
frustrating
as
writing
can
be,
not
allowing
myself
to
use
any
of
my
own
words
has
made
me
realize
how
much
I
take
this
power
of
expression
for
granted.
Second,
it
is
hard
to
break
from
the
traditions
you’re
raised
with;
from
high
school
onwards,
my
teachers
drummed
into
my
head
a
mantra
of
correct
academic
writing
(which,
if
I
may
say
so,
has
served
me
very
well
thus
far)
1. Make
sure
you
always
cite
your
sources
2. Don’t
use
too
many
quotes
3. Introduce
a
quote
in
your
own
words,
then
explain
it
and/or
its
significance
(in
your
own
words)
to
your
argument
or
sub-­‐argument
4. Go
beyond
your
research
–
don’t
just
restate,
create
The
only
one
of
these
treasured
commandments
I’ve
allowed
myself
recourse
to
is
the
last.
Perhaps
in
several
years
such
a
disclaimer
won’t
be
necessary.
Part
of
me
resents
having
to
include
it
at
all
–
I
am
trying
to
post-­‐criticize
here!
While
I
have
explicitly
defended
my
reasons
for
creating
the
essay
I
have,
I
won’t
make
the
actual
thesis
of
the
essay
explicit.
Hopefully,
that
is
to
the
work’s
(as
well
as
the
reader’s
and
my
own)
benefit.
Please
note
that
the
citations,
including
citation
styles,
and
images
used
in
this
essay
should
also
be
considered
as
further
support
for
its
thesis.

3.
“The
way
that
I
use
projects,
material,
and
writings
in
order
to
develop
a
theory…
could
be
compared
to
the
way
certain
archives
are
structured;
not
like
a
library,
but
an
accumulation
of
different
species
of
knowledge
and
matter
congregated
in
a
single
(physical)
container.”
(Miessen
2010)
___________
“From
where
do
form
and
content
derive?”
(Cufer
1996)
“We
are
not
interested
in
making
definitive
evaluations
or
declarative
statements,
but
in
creating
situations
that
offer
our
chosen
subject
as
a
complex
and
open-­‐ended
issue.”
(Group
Material
1990)
“For
it
will
be
completed
by
the
presence
of
people
and
a
programme
of
events.”
(Nesbit,
Obrist,
Tiravanija
2003)
“…Kester
describes
the
increasing
tendency
towards
collaborations
and
suggests
that
‘these
interactions
begin
to
erode
the
romantic
image
of
the
artist
as
solitary
genius,
positing
instead
a
guild-­‐like
community
of
co-­‐creators.’”
(Gere
&
Corres
2008)
“The
primary
motive
for
(Transnacionala)
was
to
organize
an
international
art
project
to
take
pace
outside
established
international
institutional
networks,
without
intermediaries,
without
a
curator-­‐formulated
concept…”
(Cufer
1996)
“…a
de-­‐authored
lineage
that
aims
to
embrace
collective
creativity….constructive
and
ameliorative.”
(Bishop
2006)
“…the
experiences
of
sharing,
commonality
and
self-­‐transcendence
turn
out
to
be
more
intense
and
significant,
in
some
ways,
than
the
postmodernist
categories
most
of
us
art-­‐types
bring
to
aesthetic
experience.
This
is
important
to
me
because
I
don’t
believe
those
categories
should
be
the
sole
arbiters
of
aesthetic
evaluation.”
(Piper
1983-­‐85)
“Each
of
the
four
exhibitions
that
we
installed
at
77
Wooster
Street
reiterated
the
interrelatedness
of
our
subjects
and
the
necessity
of
our
collaborative
process.
Our
working
method
might
best
be
described
as
painfully
democratic:
because
so
much
of
our
process
depends
on
the
review,
selection
and
critical
juxtaposition
of
innumerable
cultural
objects,
adhering
to
a
collective
process
is
extremely
time-­‐consuming
and
difficult.
However,
the
shared
learning
and
ideas
produce
results
that
are
often
inaccessible
to
those
who
work
alone.”
(Group
Material
1990)
“Our
exhibitions
and
projects
are
intended
to
be
forums
in
which
multiple
points
of
view
are
represented
in
a
variety
of
styles
and
methods.
We
believe,
as
the
feminist
writer
bel
hooks
has
said,
the
‘we
must
focus
on
a
policy
of
inclusion
so
as
not
to
mirror
oppressive
structures.’
As
a
result,
each
exhibition
is
a
veritable
model
of
democracy.

4. Mirroring
the
various
forms
of
representation
that
structure
our
understanding
of
culture,
our
exhibitions
bring
together
so-­‐called
fine
art
with
products
from
supermarkets,
mass-­‐cultural
artifacts
with
historical
objects,
actual
documentation
with
homemade
projects.
We
are
not
interested
in
making
definitive
evaluations
or
declarative
statements,
but
in
creating
situations
that
offer
our
chosen
subject
as
a
complex
and
open-­‐ended
issue.
We
encourage
greater
audience
participation
through
interpretation.”
(Group
Material
1990)
“…’participatory’…’collaborative’,
two
terms
that
are
often,
but
should
not
be,
conflated.
The
essential
gap
between
‘participation’
and
‘collaboration’
explicitly
relates
to
authorial
rights,
and
the
lack
of
influence
participants
(as
opposed
to
collaborators)
exert
over
key
structural
features
of
the
work.
As
Dave
Beech
points
out,
the
participant
typically
is
not
cast
as
an
agent
of
critique
or
subversion
but
rather
as
one
who
is
invited
to
accept
the
parameters
of
the
art
project.
To
participate
in
an
event,
whether
it
is
organized
by
Rirkrit
Tiravanija,
Jeremy
Deller,
Santiago
Sierra
or
Johanna
Billing,
is
to
enter
a
pre-­‐established
social
environment
that
casts
the
participant
in
a
very
specific
role.”
(Browne
2008)
“From
where
do
form
and
content
derive?”
(Cufer
1996)
“The
gesture
of
ceding
some
or
all
authorial
control
is
conventionally
regarded
as
more
egalitarian
and
democratic
than
the
creation
of
a
work
by
a
single
artist,
while
shared
production
is
also
seen
to
entail
the
aesthetic
benefits
of
greater
risk
and
unpredictability.
Collaborative
creativity
is
therefore
understood
both
to
emerge
from,
and
to
produce,
a
more
positive
and
non-­‐hierarchical
social
model.”
(Bishop
2006)
“Conventional
models
of
participation
are
based
on
inclusion
and
assume
that
it
goes
hand
in
hand
with
the
social-­‐democratic
protocol
of
everyone’s
voice
having
an
equal
weight
within
egalitarian
society.
Usually,
in
the
simple
act
of
proposing
a
structure
or
situation
in
which
this
bottom-­‐up
inclusion
is
promoted,
the
political
actor
or
agency
that
proposes
it
will
most
likely
be
understood
as
a
“good-­‐doer.””
(Miessen
2010)
“It’s…difficult…to
define
how
and
with
what
complications…communication
really
took
place.
The
success
of
communication
by
individuals
largely
coming
from
spaces
and
times
separate,
as
to
both
culture
and
experience,
depends
primarily
on
the
skill
of
the
individuals
and
groups
wishing
to
communicate
–
their
skill
at
playing
a
role
within
the
structure
of
the
dialogue.”
(Cufer
1996)
“…erode
the
romantic
image
…
instead
a
guild-­‐like
community
of
co-­‐creators.’”
(Gere
&
Corres
2008)

5.
“We
are
not
interested
in
making
definitive
evaluations
or
declarative
statements...”
(Group
Material
1990)
“The
metaphysics
of
this
idea
of
free
space
is
a
metaphysics
of
indeterminacy.
This
metaphysics
of
free
public
space
is
opposed
to
the
metaphysics
of
a
structured
social
and
political
body,
organized
into
and
structured
by
different
positions,
functions,
and
identities
in
terms
of
race,
gender,
profession,
and
class…Space
has
been
appropriated
in
order
to
empty
it
out,
to
present
it
as
empty,
open
for
everybody.
It
is
a
polemical
or
negative
use
of
public
space
that
presents
the
positivity
of
this
communal
space
as
such…The
most
important
aspect
is
the
de-­‐functionalization
of
urban
space:
the
interruption
of
the
usual
order
of
business,
transport,
work,
and
specialization.
But
it
is
also
the
interruption
of
the
stratified,
hierarchical
order
of
a
class
society:
the
positions
individuals
inhabit
in
the
social
order
are
suspended.”
(Hirsch
2006)
“The
space
will
be
closed
from
the
outside
world
and
mobile
phones,
radios
or
TVs
will
not
be
allowed.
This
is
to
emphasize
the
group
aspect
of
the
experiment
and
to
create
a
structure
in
which
the
‘step-­‐out’
can
be
done
commonly.
The
necessary
infrastructure
(furniture,
food,
sanitary
installations,
safety)
will
be
provided,
but
it
is
refrained
from
providing
a
programme
or
methods
to
entertain
(people
are
free
to
bring
what
they
like).
Basically,
the
experiment
will
be
able
to
see
what
happens
under
these
conditions;
people
are
freed
from
their
usual
constraints,
and
yet
confined
to
a
space
and
a
time.”
(Höller
2000).

6.
“But
surely
one
this
art
can
still
do
is
take
a
stand,
and
to
do
this
in
a
concrete
register
that
brings
together
the
aesthetic,
the
cognitive,
and
the
critical.
And
formlessness
in
society
might
be
a
condition
to
contest
rather
than
to
celebrate
in
art
–
a
condition
to
make
over
into
form
for
the
purposes
of
reflection
and
resistance.”
(Foster
2004)
“In
order
to
make
decisions
within
any
given
collaborative
structure,
network,
or
institution,
conflicts
can
ultimately
only
be
overcome
and
turned
into
practice
if
someone
assumes
responsibility.”
(Miessen
2010)
“It’s
necessary
to
try
and
be
responsible
for
something
which
I
can
take
responsibility
for.”
(Hirschhorn
2004)
“…Tiravanija
presents
a
discussion
of
his
work
in
the
third
person.”
(Bishop
2006)
“From
where
do
form
and
content
derive?”
(Cufer
1996)
“We
can
smell
the
sent
of
a
steaming
pot
of
jasmine
rice,
with
its
very
distinct
combination
of
water
and
the
perfume
of
jasmine….
Sunlight
pours
in
from
an
October
afternoon,
and
already
we
feel
the
compression
of
the
gallery
lifted
from
our
shoulders…As
one
sits
down
for
the
bowl
(white
enamel
with
blue
rimes)
of
food,
one
begins
to
realize
that
this
a
distinctively
different
experience
from
others
we
have
had
in
an
art
gallery
or
with
art.”
(Tiravanija
2004)
“I
want
to
make
an
experience….
I
want
the
public
to
be
transformed
by
the
experience…I
want
the
public
to
appropriate…I
wand
the
public
to
be
active,
participate....
I
want
the
public
to
confront
what
is
important…I
don’t
want
the
public
to
understand.
I
want
the
public
to
seize
the
power.”
(Hirschhorn
2004)
“Once
again,
the
reintroduction
of
food
as
the
key
element
in
the
approach
of
the
work
is
central.
In
tandem
with
this
element
Tiravanija
makes
references
to
the
core
ideas
of
conceptual
art
that
question
the
idealism
behind
the
relevance
of
authorship
and
authenticity.”
(Tiravanija
2004)
“…on
a
technical
level,
most
contemporary
art
is
collectively
produced
(even
if
authorship
often
remains
resolutely
individual).”
(Bishop
2006)

7.
“…undo
the
innocence
of
participation.”
(Meissen
2010)
“’The
question’,
Huyghe
argues,
‘is
less
“what?”
than
“to
whom?”
It
becomes
a
question
of
address’.
Bourriaud
also
sees
art
as
‘an
ensemble
of
units
to
be
reactivated
by
the
beholder-­‐manipulator’.
In
many
ways
this
approach
is
another
legacy
of
the
Duchampian
provocation,
but
when
is
such
‘reactivation’
too
great
a
burden
to
place
on
the
viewer,
too
ambiguous
a
test?
As
with
previous
attempts
to
involve
the
audience
directly
(in
some
abstract
painting
or
some
conceptual
art)
there
is
a
risk
of
illegibility
here,
which
might
reintroduce
the
artist
as
the
principal
figure
and
the
primary
exegete
of
the
work.
At
times,
‘the
death
of
the
author’
has
meant
not
‘the
birth
of
the
reader’,
as
Roland
Barthes
speculated,
so
much
as
the
befuddlement
of
the
viewer.”
(Foster
2004)
“We
don’t
use
the
word
‘practice’
lightly
–
it’s
as
if
the
artist
were
a
doctor
administering
the
viewer
with
a
dose
of
opiate
to
cure
all
maladies.”
(Tiravanija
2004)
“More
modestly,
these
artists
aim
to
turn
passive
viewers
into
a
temporary
community
of
active
interlocutors.
(Foster
2004)

8.
“…participation
is
often
read
through
romantic
notions
of
negotiation,
inclusion,
and
democratic
decision-­‐making.
However,
it
is
precisely
this
often-­‐unquestioned
mode
of
inclusion…that
does
not
produce
significant
results,
as
criticality
is
challenged
by
the
concept
of
the
majority.”
(Meissen
2010)
“We
are
not
interested
in
making
definitive
evaluations
or
declarative
statements,
but
in
creating
situations
that
offer
our
chosen
subject
as
a
complex
and
open-­‐ended
issue.”
(Group
Material
1990)
“…the
self-­‐reflexive
preoccupation
with
the
identity
and
status
of
artist,
curator
and
institution
plays
on
the
symbolic
negation
of
these
positions,
but
paradoxically
can
only
do
so
only
by
sustaining
them
in
practice.
The
dramatization
of
the
self-­‐
reflexive
defers
endlessly
any
critical
debate
on
the
actual,
cultural
potential
and
quality
of
definable
artwork…”
(Charlesworth
2006)
“…Whereas
social
dance
in
white
culture
is
often
viewed
in
terms
of
achievement,
social
grace
or
competence,
or
spectator-­‐oriented
entertainment,
it
is
a
collective
and
participatory
mean
so
f
self-­‐transcendence
and
social
union
in
black
culture
along
many
dimensions,
and
so
is
often
much
more
fully
integrated
into
daily
life.
Thus
it
is
based
on
a
system
of
symbols,
cultural
meanings,
attitudes
and
patterns
of
movement
that
one
must
directly
experience
in
order
to
understand
fully...My
immediate
aim
in
staging
the
large-­‐scale
performance
(preferably
with
sixty
people
or
more)
was
to
enable
everyone
present
to
GET
DOWN
AND
PARTY.
TOGETHER….
I
began
by

9. introducing
some
of
the
basic
dance
movements
to
the
audience,
and
discussing
their
cultural
and
historical
background,
meanings,
and
the
roles
they
play
in
black
culture…
The
aim
was
to
transmit
and
share
a
physical
language
that
everyone
was
then
empowered
to
use….
We
were
all
engaged
in
the
pleasurable
process
of
self-­‐
transcendence
and
creative
expression
within
a
highly
structured
and
controlled
cultural
idiom,
in
a
way
that
attempted
to
overcome
cultural
and
racial
barriers.”
(Piper
1985)
“…This
revealing
of
one’s
self
within
the
work
is
an
important
legacy
of
postcolonial
and
feminist
discourses
that
deemphasize
and
exaggerate
the
historical
construction
of
artistic
persona.”
(Gillick
2006)
“Participating
in
the
system
doesn’t
mean
that
we
must
identify
with
it,
stop
criticizing
it,
or
stop
improving
the
little
piece
of
turf
on
which
we
operate”
(Wright,
cited
by
Group
Material
1990)

10. Works
Cited
Bishop,
Claire.
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London:
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Browne,
Sarah.
"Crowd
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Charlesworth,
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"Curating
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Art
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Cufer,
Eda.
(1996)
"Transnacionala
A
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East
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the
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Participation,
edited
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138-­‐143.
London:
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2006.
Foster,
Hal.
(2004)
"Chat
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In
Participation,
edited
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Claire
Bishop,
138-­‐
143.
London:
Whitechapel,
2006.
Gere,
Charlie
&
Corris,
Michael.
Non-­‐Relational
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Gillick,
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Bishop,
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"Letters
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October
115,
no.
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(2006):
95-­‐107.
Group
Material
(1990)
"On
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In
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edited
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Bishop,
135-­‐137.
London:
Whitechapel,
2006.
Hirschhorn,
Thomas.
(2004)
"24h
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In
Participation,
edited
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Bishop,
138-­‐143.
London:
Whitechapel,
2006.
Hirsch,
Michael.
(2006)
"The
Space
of
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Between
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In
Did
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edited
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Höller,
Carsten.
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"The
Baudoin/Boudewijn
Experiment:
A
Deliberate,
Non-­‐
Fatalistic,
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Experiment
in
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In
Participation,
edited
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Claire
Bishop,
144-­‐145.
London:
Whitechapel,
2006.
Miessen,
Markus.
The
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[Crossbench
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New
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Nesbit,
Molly,
Obrist,
Hans-­‐Ulrich,
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Tiravanija,
Rirkrit.
(2003)
"What
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Station?"
In
Participation,
edited
by
Claire
Bishop,
138-­‐143.
London:
Whitechapel,
2006.

11. North,
Ryan.
"Comic2-­‐2056."
Web
comic.
www.qwantz.com,
2011.
———.
"Comic2-­‐2282."
Web
comic.
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2012.
———.
"Comic2-­‐2306."
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comic.
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Piper,
Adrian(1983-­‐85)
"Notes
on
Funk,
I-­‐II,
1983-­‐85.”
In
Participation,
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130-­‐134.
London:
Whitechapel,
2006.
Plagiarism:
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Tiravanija,
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In
Participation,
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London:
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Smith,
Sarah.
"Lip
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Screen
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