This text from 7 th december 2018 !! a new version has been now uploaded June 2020 http://www.emergencyrooms.org/formats.html

1. Towards a Definition of Format Art.
On the social, political and critical potential of Thierry Geoffroy’s art formats
Time after time it has been claimed that the Danish-French artist Thierry Geoffroy / Colonel is first
and foremost a catalyst . Seen in the light of the artist’s practice, which he refers to as format art, to1
use this term in describing the role of the artist seems accurate and of no small importance. Being a
catalyst involves precipitating events, and whenever he creates a new work of format art, this is
exactly what Geoffroy does. When the artist for example asks people to debate while running in his
art format Critical Run, or when he invites other artists to express about the emergencies and crises
of today every single day in the exhibition format Emergency Room, he causes these artistic events
to happen on the basis of an aesthetic, which can be characterized as socially and critically
engaging. Following a short introduction to Geoffroy’s methods and practice, we will look into the
nature and aesthetics of, as well as the motivation behind format art. Through an analysis of the art
format Emergency Room, it will be examined how the aesthetics of format art can be characterised
in the specific art format. Finally, the potential of format art will be discussed in the context of
contemporary art practice, especially in opposition to another field of aesthetics, namely relational
aesthetics as formulated by Nicolas Bourriaud.
The art format’s reproducible ‘now’
The term format art has been used in numerous contexts to describe Geoffroy’s practice, but rather
little work has been done to define or specify the concept itself. Therefore, let us first start by
characterising the origin of the term and some of the key elements of format art, which have been
examined in earlier work. The theoretical foundation of format art was released with the publication
of Geoffroy’s Moving Exhibitions Manifesto in 1989, where the framework of five different types of
so-called moving exhibitions, which have all been executed by the artist in different forms, is laid
out. Like Geoffroy’s art formats the 1989 manifesto prescribes the recipe for unfolding certain
concepts of the artist adapted to different situations, locations, and audiences. In the manifesto the
Rosenvinge, Line, Thierry Geoffroy / Colonel – ”Catalyst.”, David Dunchin, trans. Written and produced in1
conjunction with the Top Up salon featuring Thierry Geoffroy / Colonel, held at Rahbeks Allé 32, Frederiksberg,
Denmark, 18 November 2010, p. 12.
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2. moving exhibition is defined as ‘the creator in an eternal search’, as ‘mobile both geographically
and in its form of expression, in that it adapts to life’ . It goes further, explaining the different2
shapes a moving exhibition can take when realised under different circumstances in e.g. a museum,
a supermarket, and other more or less unconventional exhibition venues. All types of moving
exhibitions have been realised by the artist numerous times in various ways. Similar to the moving
exhibition, format art is based on a given set of rules, some of which can be altered each time the art
format is activated according to the particular setting and participants. Besides the changes within
the structure of an art format, it can be argued that the relation between the art format, space, and
time changes accordingly – like in the moving exhibition concept, in order to ‘adapt to life’. Dr.
Rita Sebestyén writes how “an art format put up in a museum would differ slightly from an art
format activated in a gallery. Other outward factors that could change the art format could be the
political climate ”. Take for example the before mentioned art format Critical Run, in which the3
viewers are activated and transformed into participants of a run – not to compete, but to debate
together. While the concept of running while debating is always the same, the setting and subject to
debate are variable components of the art format. This morning (Wednesday, 10 October 2018)
Geoffroy posted a video on his Instagram profile, shot in the current exhibition at Kunsthalle
Mannheim, in which he and curator Sebastian Baden run around the museum building, exchanging
views on contemporary art’s possible incapability of expressing about emergencies due to the
current structure of the museum institution. In comparison the Critical Run format has also been
activated at the Venice Biennale several times where groups of participants were stimulated to
question the structure and motivations of the biennale while running . The two cases show only two4
out of several different ways in which the individual art format can be activated, leading to different
outcomes and effects every time it is performed.
Ibid. p. 9.2
Sebestyén, Rita, ”Before It Is Too Late”, on Sebestyén Rita, 30 May 2016, http://sebestyenrita.com/before-it-is-too-3
late/ (accessed 25 September 2018).
Baden, Sebastian, ”Thierry Geoffroy’s ’Emergency Room’”, in Kunst und Öffentlichkeit, Dagmar Danko, Olivier4
Moeschler and Florian Schumacher, eds., Springer VS, 2015, p. 133.
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3. Baden refers to Geoffroy’s art formats as Bewegungsmethoden , methods of movement, which5
applies to the state of the participants involved in an art format both physically and figuratively
speaking. For Geoffroy it seems that the physical movement, often including the element of haste
(running, producing artworks in the moment, etc.) connects with the movement of the participators’
mind to activate critical thinking. Baden states how the aspect of simultaneity is always at play in
format art, as the effect is always produced in the ‘now’, before it is too late . Besides the fleeting6
hit et nunc of the art format, its unique existence in a particular time and space, which can never be
reproduced, the format still allows for reproducibility in its form per definition. As Sebestyén
stresses, the same format can be adapted according to different participants and situations . One7
could claim that the nature of the art format thus draws parallels to the practice of the late French
artist Yves Klein, one of Geoffroy’s art historical sources of inspiration . In this sense an8
exemplification can be made through Klein’s famous invention of the colour International Klein
Blue (IKB), which can be considered an art format similar to the ones of Geoffroy to the extent that
Klein’s particular blue did not only serve as an artwork in itself, but allowed for endless
reproducibility extensively throughout the artist’s career in his monochromes, performances, etc.
The irreplaceable ‘now’ that the IKB colour creates by the lack of any secondary significance to the
very presence of the colour (think for instance Klein’s monochromatic paintings), simultaneously
constitutes a ‘now’, which can be endlessly reproduced in new constellations through the repetition
of the exact shade of blue. Likewise, an art format by Geoffroy always provides the same
framework for a new and each time slightly differing artistic event to take place every time the art
format is activated. This framework, designed to take multiple forms, thus constitutes the
potentiality of establishing multiple ‘nows’, which, despite their form always point back to the
original concept of the art format itself as well as the large network of different versions of the
given art format, which have ever been produced.
Ibid. p. 131.5
Baden, p. 134.6
Sebestyén, http://sebestyenrita.com/before-it-is-too-late/7
Gade, Rune, ”Et solidt fundament. Kunst og fotografi 1980-2000”, in Mette Sandbye (ed.), Dansk fotografihistorie,8
Copenhagen: Gyldendal, 2004, p. 397.
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4. Format art as response to a globalised world
The reproducibility of Geoffroy’s art formats also relates to the fact that the artist developed format
art with knowledge from the entertainment industry, namely the television program format, which
he views from a critically reflective perspective. As with TV program formats, art institutions
wanting to use an art format must purchase a license and agree to use the original title, concept and
method . Another element of format art, which derives from TV, is the vast video and photo9
documentation of the formats, which facilitates their expansion to online platforms. The artist is
always in the middle of the turmoil, encouraging the participants and documenting the events.
Danish art historian Rune Gade emphasises how the fleeting, fast paced, and perfomative nature of
Geoffroy’s art formats unlike other similar artistic approaches, is designed to be caught on
camera . Hence the art formats are always documented, though not for the archives, but to be10
“transposed into new works, destined to achieve their autonomy in fresh contexts, and so conducing
to an ever-proliferating mise en abyme ”. From Geoffroy’s ever new ways of operating across11
media and thematics one recognises how format art is not only to be understood as an isolated series
of works in the artist’s oeuvre, as it rather constitutes the very method of creating artworks based on
the consistent use of a carefully developed and intertwined vocabulary of images and concepts.
Thus, format art does not only seem to happen in the moment, but leaves physical traces as well
through endless video and photo documentation, facilitating an infinitely recurring sequence of
images produced inside and across the individual art formats.
Simultaneously one can argue that this method of imitating the mass media’s way of
communication by endless circulation of images is aimed at shaping institutions and even whole
societies through the process. In other words format art is intended to reach a vast audience, which,
together with the fluid design of the art formats, allows for a flexibility that makes format art
Geoffroy, Thierry, ”The Emergency Room Format”, on Emergencyrooms.org, http://www.emergencyrooms.org/9
short.html (accessed on 10 October 2018)
Gade, Rune, ”But His Wife Is Danish – on colonization, being colonized and Colonel”, in Colonel: Avoir L’air, Line10
Rosenvinge and Marita Muukkonen, eds., NIFCA Publications, 2006, p. 58.
Gade, p. 58.11
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5. suitable for activation on a global scale. Like many other contemporary art practices, format art
works on a global level to expand critical platforms in different societies, taking an active, even
interventionist, role in addressing and responding to the problems of globalisation . For Geoffroy12
this often revolves around the issue of identity through what appears to be parodies of current
discourses on notions of cultural ‘inbetweenness’ . But as curator Seamus Kealy writes, “in fact,13
the ongoing Colonel project is a deliberate set of encounters that make this very
‘inbetweenness’(and its dizziness before the lens of the video-camera or within the odd parameters
of the Peter Sellers-like, charismatic persona of Colonel’s naïve questions) shimmer with familiarity
and buckle under the weight of a gaze … as it very well should ”. It should be mentioned that14
Geoffroy’s artist name Colonel derives from the military rank of the same title, which, according to
Kealy “becomes twisted in meaning to convey a duty that must be done ” when modified by the15
artist. Similarly the concept of format art is based on the idea of a duty to be done, namely the call
of the artist to fight apathy on a global scale . This can be considered the major motivation behind16
format art, which will be elaborated further in the following sections through an analysis of the art
format created by Geoffroy, Emergency Room.
The social engagement of Emergency Room
Emergency Room is one of the first internationally activated art formats by Thierry Geoffroy, from
which all other of the artist’s art formats emerge in one way or another. The format is a specially
designed space for exhibitions changing every day, where professional artists are invited to express
and rank the most alarming emergencies of today. At a certain time each day during the exhibition
Ratnam, Niru, ”Art and globalisation”, in Themes in Contemporary Art, Gill Perry and Paul Wood, eds., Yale12
University Press, 2004, p. 292.
Kealy, Seamus, ”Awareness Muscle: A Text in Two Parts. Part One: Pre-Arrival”, on thierrygeoffroy.blogspot, 1713
June 2007, http://thierrygeoffroy.blogspot.com (accessed on 11 October 2018).
Ibid.14
Ibid.15
Geoffroy, Thierry, Emergency Room Dictionary, Revolver Publishing by VVV & The Royal Danish Academy of16
Fine Arts, Schools of Visual Arts, 2010, pp. 17-19.
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6. period, the artworks in the exhibition must be replaced by new ones. Approximately 450 artists have
participated in Emergency Room in eight institutions around the world, including MoMA PS1 in
New York . The fast paced conditions of constant daily production generate artistic experiments17
and new forms of artistic expression, which can be considered the aesthetics of emergency. In the
following we will look further into how the aesthetics of emergency can be understood by unfolding
Geoffroy’s art format Emergency Room.
Now before it is too late
In 2007 Emergency Room was activated at MoMA PS1 in New York. As always the exhibition was
vastly documented by Geoffroy and the photos and video clips has since been circulating on the
artist’s website and social media. Taking a look at pictures of the then exhibition space, one
recognises that the Emergency Room is placed inside the museum’s usual exhibition space as a
separate circular construction with an entrance and exit. The circular architecture of Emergency
Room musters inclusion, equality and involvement per se, taking the form of a debate chamber
rather than a traditional exhibition space. Outside, next to the entrance, a clock was placed on the
wall, allowing the participating artists and museum visitors to keep track of the time until the next
change of works on show would take place. Every day prior to the change of works in the
exhibition Geoffroy would meet with the participating artists under the clock and film and interview
them about their motivations, ideas, opinions, feelings, etc. just before they would bring their works
to the room . As examined by Gade, the documentation serves as an important element of18
Geoffroy’s art formats, not just as regular documentation, but also rather as individual pieces of art,
adding to the bigger picture of the artist’s practice . In Emergency Room, capturing the anger,19
frustration or nervousness of the artists on camera in the moment, the documentation of e.g. drops
of sweat on an artist’s forehead serves as an indicator or evidence of the artists’ emotional state,
proving the relevance and emergency of their newly produced artworks. As Geoffroy writes in his
Geoffroy, http://www.emergencyrooms.org/short.html17
Lassen, Nikolaj M., ”Præsens. Den dansk-franske kunstner Thierry Geoffroy og hans Emergency Room – en18
kunstudstilling som skifter indhold hver 24. Time – har haft enorm succes de seneste seks uger på New Yorks fineste
kunstgalleri”, in Weekendavisen, Kultur, No. 13, Berlingske Media, 30 March 2007, p. 11.
Gade, ”But His Wife Is Danish…”, p. 58.19
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7. definition of format art, “a format is a concept including acteurs with their feelings, desires, pains,
complaints, jealousy, etc., interacting.” . To cite Baden’s reference to format art as ‘methods of20
movement’ , Emergency Room becomes an in time rendezvous for artists and museum goers to21
express and exchange viewpoints, the movement manifested in the interaction of the artists and
audience being emphasised by the fast moving concept of a constantly changing exhibition.
In this way the art format Emergency Room suggests new and unconventional ways of perceiving
contemporary art, where news value and relevance serve as overshadowing aesthetic criteria. In
relation to our perception of the contemporary and contemporary art, it is important to stress that
Geoffroy sees the contemporary as an impossible condition, therefore using the term
‘ultracontemporary’ instead when referring to the art exhibited in Emergency Room . The idea is22
that contemporary art as we know it, exhibited and experienced in the museum, is not fully capable
of expressing about contemporary problematics due to the delay in time from when the artwork is
created and when it is actually exhibited. This relates to why, after being on show for 24 hours and
then being replaced by fresh artworks, the most works by the participating artists at MOMA PS1
would go to the Delay Museum, another exhibition space situated in elongation of the Emergency
Room. By creating a ‘delay museum’ in relation to the Emergency Room, Geoffroy brings the
viewer’s attention to the expiration of the specific ‘nowness’ of the exhibited works, a ‘nowness’,
which attains a different value when perceived in the state of emergency than in the state of delay.
When encountering an artwork with the perception of the aesthetic criteria of emergency and
‘nowness’ that format art calls for, it is tempting to ask oneself the question if contemporary art as
we usually experience it in a contemporary art museum is qualified to express relevantly about the
contemporary? With Emergency Room and the corresponding delay museum, Geoffroy points to
how the aesthetic value of format art must consequently be perceived in terms of its own premises,
which are the premises of action taken and debate spoken by artists and viewers in the ‘now’,
proposing that what we usually understand by the concept of ‘contemporary art’ is by default
Geoffroy, Emergency Room Dictionary, p. 84.20
Baden, p. 131.21
Geoffroy, Emergency Room Dictionary, p. 41.22
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8. already too late. Sebestyén writes that the action or event in format art ‘has in itself an immediate
aesthetic value’, whereas the socially and politically sensitive side of the method is more distinct,
having a ‘contemplative-reflective effect’ . According to Sebestyén, Geoffroy works to shorten or23
reduce this effect , which is done in the Emergency Room format by giving the participating artists24
and museum goers the opportunity to express about the emergencies of today, going behind the, for
artists often time-consuming process of collaborating with a museum on making an exhibition.
Instead, Emergency Room offers a shortcut for artists, institution, and viewers to rank and raise
questions about the social and political emerging situations today. Thus, format art functions as an
answer to what can be considered an increasing and urgent need to raise these questions about
urgent political issues, whether it be the environment, migration, women’s rights, etc.,
simultaneously providing a critique of the art world, and, as present in Emergency Room, a critical
view on the museum institution as addressed by the institution itself.
As Danish philosopher Carsten Friberg writes, when Geoffroy questions the art institutions, the
assumption about the museum, the biennales, art fairs etc. “is not that they do not matter, or that
they are not actively participating in the negotiation and redistribution of the sensible, hence
challenging the political” . Rather, Geoffroy warns against “falling into a self-confirmation and25
collective indifference to the world outside the art world and art events” . In the case of26
Emergency Room this is done by minimising the delay of artist’s response time to contemporary
social and political issues, suggesting a model where the museum becomes capable of dealing with
contemporary art in a way, which allows for the necessary immediacy such works often call for,
simultaneously creating an open and critical discourse. It can be argued that modern institutions,
Sebestyén, http://sebestyenrita.com/before-it-is-too-late/23
Ibid.24
Friberg, Carsten, ”’Now before it is too late’ – Ultracontemporary art as a response to contemporary political25
apathy”, on Copenhagenbiennale.org, http://www.copenhagenbiennale.org/carsten-friberg/
rmx2s5lhmnetk52cmn2bdzz3ye2zp9 (accessed on 12 October 2018).
Ibid.26
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9. like the museum, posit an ideal world, from which a critique of the real world can be phrased . If27
the role of the museum institution, born out of the Age of Enlightenment and democratic ideals, is
still, among other things, to educate and alert the public, format art provides in the case of
Emergency Room a standard for avoiding indifference or apathy towards urgent sociopolitical
matters inside, and eventually outside, the art world and walls of the museum. Speaking of format
art as a ‘method of movement’ (Baden) this might be the most crucial movement of the mechanism
of format art, namely to provide a model for institutional critique embedded in the very structure of
the museum and its exhibition production, eventually leading to change in society at large.
As previously touched upon, the main motivation behind format art is to fight apathy inside and
outside the art world, which can be seen as a growingly urgent task as the accelerating access to and
circulation of information in society today consequently leads to insensibility and indifference
among the population . If the museum represents a global platform for addressing this problem,28
Emergency Room and format art in general carries social and political change as its potential by
demonstrating a model, which contains an aesthetic dimension that constitutes a system of
realisation through movement, participation, and engagement, manifested in the drops of sweat on
an artist’s forehead, the immersion in a vibrant debate, the physical and emotional exhaustion from
producing artworks every single day, and so on.
The aesthetics of social engagement
Every museum exhibition can be considered a strategic system of representations, which will
always seek to achieve influence, thus figuring as an integrated part of the culture industry .29
Additionally, one can argue that institutions exercise control of art that has political, perhaps
oppositional, elements by institutionalising it in what Friberg refers to as “a system of perception,
Birken, Jacob, “’Is the Contemporary Already Too Late?’ (Re-)producing Criticality within the Art Museum, in27
Katarzyna Murawska-Muthesius and Piotr Piotrowski (eds.), From Museum Critique to the Critical Museum,
Routledge, 2015, p. 226.
Friberg, http://www.copenhagenbiennale.org/carsten-friberg/rmx2s5lhmnetk52cmn2bdzz3ye2zp928
Ferguson, Bruce W.,”Exhibition Rhetorics: Material Speech and Utter Sense”, in Bruce W. Ferguson, Reesa29
Greenberg, and Sandy Nairne (eds.), Thinking about Exhibitions, London: Routledge, 1996, pp. 178-179.
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10. controlled by the silent space of the museum in which the solitude and passivity of passers-by
encounter the solitude and passivity of artworks” . One can claim that art, thus, in the setting of30
the museum institution, is detached from its world, only to be placed in the context of an aesthetic
appreciation responding to the aesthetic expectations of the audience. And this system or spectacle
is exactly what Geoffroy seeks to diminish with the art format Emergency Room. In this regard the
aesthetics of social engagement, as seen in Emergency Room, can be defined by giving art a critical
and political potential through interventions into the very structure of the museum institution – a
potential, which is realised through the social engagement of the participants of the art format and
seems to carry the power to deflate the spectacle of the culture industry from the inside. When the
museum exhibition as in Emergency Room suddenly no longer implies a pursuance of
accommodating the expectations of a certain audience, the exhibition model comes closer to being
identifiable with lived reality beyond the walls of the museum than being a mere product of the
culture industry. However, because of its setting in the museum space, which is usually
predetermined to practice the reproduction of a special system that, according to Friberg, controls
and pacifies art works and the viewer’s perception , the Emergency Room art format seems at first31
sight to feed into this system by simply being another exhibition played out by the museum
institution for the culture industry. But through a familiarisation with the institution and its
structures, the art format plays by the institutional rules only to break them, not letting it’s political
and social content and potential be controlled or pacified.
To exemplify how Emergency Room breaks with the rules and norms of the museum institution, in a
review of the Emergency Room exhibition at MoMA PS1, writer James DeWille writes about his
experience of the show: “Upon entry, a viewer is confronted by a multitude of pieces, ranging from
videos to performances and sculpture, on the walls and floor. There are sounds and screens, and
even the artists themselves roam through the crowd. The atmosphere is kinetic and manic, making
Friberg, http://www.copenhagenbiennale.org/carsten-friberg/rmx2s5lhmnetk52cmn2bdzz3ye2zp930
Friberg, http://www.copenhagenbiennale.org/carsten-friberg/rmx2s5lhmnetk52cmn2bdzz3ye2zp931
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11. the gallery an exciting place to be” . At first sight, the exhibition appears similar to a traditional32
museum show with works in different media arranged in the room. But what the review then
focuses on is the description of a ‘kinetic and manic’ atmosphere in the exhibition where artists,
critics, volunteers, and viewers all engage in activities and dialogue – a description, which is
somehow out of the ordinary exhibition review of a common museum show. From DeWille’s
description we sense how Emergency Room is able to involve its participants directly in the
exhibition format and the exhibited works, suggesting another model in which the audience is
actually enabled to take action and shape the exhibition through their actions and viewpoints. Thus,
through a constant flow of debate, events, and production of artworks, the exhibition seems to reach
out to its audience in an attempt to engage and involve the participants in the debate that the
exhibition fosters the given day, qualifying the institution to activate itself as a social rendezvous
and exhibition space based on dialogue. In this way, Emergency Room seems to elude
institutionalisation and censorship by leaving room for the artists as well as the viewers to express
freely about socio-political questions of today in the ‘now’ whether it be climate change, migrant
crisis, or something else entirely, providing an alternative exhibition model that serves as a platform
from which the critique of the institution itself, its system and structure, can evolve . The33
possibility of criticising and even changing the museum institution’s norms and ways of
communicating fixed perceptions through exhibition production is in Emergency Room embedded
in the format itself. By creating a genuine community, in which concrete experience is built,
Geoffroy provides with Emergency Room an efficient tool and model for the museum institution to
use in refining and re-adjusting its critical potential, which will in time hopefully mirror a change of
things in society itself .34
This brings us back to the by the artist claimed intention of format art to fight apathy, which
Emergency Room seems especially suitable for as it gives artists and viewers the possibility to
DeWille, James, ”Live From N.Y., It’s Yesterday’s News”, on Columbiaspectator.com, 27 March, 2013, https://32
www.columbiaspectator.com/2007/02/21/live-ny-its-yesterdays-news/ (accessed on 12 October 2018)
Birken, pp. 226-227.33
Birken, p. 227.34
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12. capture important and intricate issues in their world, enabling an exhibition model in a constant
state of reconception and flux. Geoffroy describes apathy as the enemy of format art, as the “lack of
emotion, motivation, or enthusiasm”, manifesting itself as a “learned helplessness”, “making
artists perform for the culture industry” . Mainly the fluidity of the nature of the art format (its35
changing scenario of artworks on show each day during the exhibition period, its flow of events and
debates constantly taking place in the exhibition, and the continuous circulation of documentation
of the participating artists and viewers’ reactions), contributes to fight the apathy, which, according
to Geoffroy, makes up a threat in society in the world today. By bringing the exhibition situation
closer to life outside the museum through social engagement and activation of its participants, and
by making the Emergency Room format a global phenomenon through online but also physical
distribution (soon after the exhibition at MoMA PS1 the concept would travel to Athens, Istanbul,
and Toronto among other cities ), the art format forms an engagement and interrelation between36
itself and the outside world through a direct and critical dialogue with its audience and the affecting
narratives that the artworks and artists present in the exhibition. Indifference and insensitivity are
simply not options of reaction inside Emergency Room where art is created and shown in real time
and not in delay.
Format art in the context of contemporary art practice
Thus, Emergency Room can be characterised by the aesthetics of social, political and critical
engagement in relating just as much to the urgency and immediacy of artworks as to the
encouragement and stimulation of critical thinking in its participants. For this purpose, the art
format takes the museum institution as its starting point for its continuous production, making the
waves needed ‘to amplify capacities and replace repetition with direct involvement and action’ .37
As stated by Geoffroy, format art can be described as a method born out of a need to fight apathy in
Geoffroy, Emergency Room Dictionary, p. 17.35
Friis, Morten, ”Den dag revolutionen kom forbi”, on Cph-art.dk, 22 May, 2007, http://www.cph-art.dk/konceptkunst/36
EmergencyRoom (accessed on 12 October 2018).
Oikonomopoulos, Vassilios, ”The Biennalist in Athens – Emergencies in the midst of unfulfilled promises”, on37
Emergency.org, November, 2011, http://www.cph-art.dk/konceptkunst/EmergencyRoom (accessed on 14 October
2018).
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13. the world at large , thus forming a collective practice, realised through the actions and engagement38
of the performing participants. In this sense, it seems reasonable to view the practice of format art in
comparison with and application to another contemporary art practice, namely the one of relational
aesthetics as formulated by French curator Nicolas Bourriaud. As Sebestyén demonstrates,
Bourriaud’s notion of relational arts can be used constructively in enriching discourses both on the
visual and conceptual characteristics of format art and the different art formats’ performative
qualities . In the following, it will however be argued that format art, rather than fitting39
unproblematically into the field of relational aesthetics, provides a rather different model in the
context of contemporary art practice.
Format art’s social, political, and critical potential
Since Bourriaud published his book Relational Aesthetics in 1998, his influential art criticism has
extensively marked a perception of contemporary art practice of the 1990’s and onwards. A
practice, which, according to Bourriaud, in short can be characterised by the conceiving of artists as
facilitators rather than makers, where artworks are based on human relations and their social context
and regarded as information exchanged between artist and viewer . Gone is the work of art as40
independent, abstract idea and object, leaving the viewer as participant in the artistic gesture, now
an intangible act, proposing new ways of creating social relationships. While Geoffroy’s art formats
in many ways seem to apply to Bourriaud’s notion of the artist as facilitator, or as Rosenvinge puts
it, ‘catalyst’ , handing the viewer the means to change the world socially and politically through41
performative, artistic acts and gestures, the difference between format art and relational art seems to
lie in the method and motivation behind the two. Whereas the theoretical horizon of relational art
Geoffroy, Emergency Room Dictionary, p. 17.38
Sebestyén, http://sebestyenrita.com/before-it-is-too-late/39
Bourriaud, Nicolas, Relational Aesthetics, Simon Pleasance and Fronza Woods, trans., Les presses du réel, 200240
(1998), p. 16.
Rosenvinge, p. 12.41
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14. belongs to the sphere of human interaction by building forms of existence and models of action
inside the structure of the already existing world, the foundation of format art is built upon the
desire to create new models of potentiality of change, which does not yet exist. According to
Bourriaud, contemporary artists and their interlocutors are in the process of ‘learning to inhabit the
world in a better way’ , a theory based on observation of the present where the work of the artists,42
which he analyses, appears as reactions to the conditions that define the globalised social order .43
Though format art responds to globalisation as well, and the format is per definition shaped to
become global , it nevertheless prepares the ground for a different process, in which artists and44
viewers are stimulated to engage critically in the outside world through new interferences and
patterns. In this sense, format art can be said to operate as ‘wake up models’, offering artists and the
public the means to actually create a different reality, instead of only operating inside and accepting
the existing model.
Besides its refusal to simply accept and learn to inhabit the world as it is, format art does not in all
of its aspects seem to apply to the small-scale, tactical approach, relating to the micro-community in
front of the artwork, characteristic for art within the field of relational aesthetics . Rather,45
Geoffroy’s project is eventually to accomplish political and social transformation on a much bigger
scale, for instance manifested in the implementation of Emergency Rooms at every museum in the
world . Of course, Geoffroy’s art formats, like relational art, also work on a small-scale level, but46
only in order to reach further out for maximum influence, ultimately reaching a bigger potential and
wider audience. It is possible to criticise relational aesthetics for being restricted to the space of
Bourriaud, p. 13.42
Tapper, Nick, ”Me and You and Everyone we know: The Aesthetics of Joining In”, on The University of Western43
Aurstralia, August, 2006, http://www.ias.uwa.edu.au/new-critic/two/meyouandeveryone (accessed 9 October 2018).
Davis, Jacquelyn, ”Interview with Thierry Geoffroy”, on Jacquelyn Davis, 5 June 2012, http://44
jsd.instrumentandoccupation.se/interview-with-thierry-geoffroy (accessed 25 September 2018).
Bourriaud, pp. 60-61.45
Friis, http://www.cph-art.dk/konceptkunst/EmergencyRoom46
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15. galleries and art centres, thus contradicting the desire for sociability underpinning their meaning .47
Similarly, Geoffroy’s art format Emergency Room has been criticised for being unable to live out its
social, political, and critical potential within the context of the art institution . In a review of the art48
format, art writer Natalie Hegert writes: “In the Emergency Room, urgent issues are exhibited, but
to whom? A gallery setting can only reach a certain segment of the population; whereas the street
art model reaches many more people, it is more likely to be disregarded” . When directing this49
criticism towards Emergency Room, it is however important to take the art format’s potential
criticism of the museum into account, which, as examined, is embedded in the format itself.
Simultaneously, one can argue that things are not that straightforward, as realising an art format in a
museum does not preclude the possibility of making other art formats elsewhere, e.g. in the street as
seen for example in the art format Critical Run.
In relation to this, it can be argued that format art must always be perceived as multiple interrelated
events or movements, and never solely as individual, small-scale undertakings or exhibitions. Seen
in this light, Emergency Room marks only a fraction of the overall approach and action done by
Geoffroy through his art formats to ultimately pursue a world of greater alertness, awareness and
engagement. The art formats by the artist, including Emergency Room, Critical Run, Biennalist, and
Awareness Muscle, only to mention a few, are all interconnected in different ways, shaping a
vocabulary of multiple performative and artistic gestures inside the same aesthetic language.
Furthermore, Geoffroy’s use of mass media in his art formats, as examined by Gade among others,
demonstrates the vision of format art to relate to the world outside the museum, involving the large-
scale public on a global level just as much as the participants in the front row to the artworks and
events on site. International media vastly documented Emergency Room throughout the exhibition
period at MoMA PS1, spreading the message to the public around the globe . For instance the New50
Bourriaud, pp. 81-82.47
Hegert, Natalie, ”Emergency Case”, on Artslant.com, 10 November, 2008, https://www.artslant.com/ny/articles/48
show/2829-emergency-case (accessed on 14 October 2018)
Ibid.49
Friis, http://www.cph-art.dk/konceptkunst/EmergencyRoom50
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16. York based TV channel ABC News reported from Emergency Room during the exhibition,
interviewing some of the participating artists. Here, artist Gail Rothschild presented her artwork of
the day to the camera, telling how she ‘was struck by the bizarre die-off of honeybees’ and inspired
to make an artwork about it . Through massive international media coverage an artwork like this,51
which is dealing with environmental problems affecting every human, animal and nation on this
planet, achieves world-wide recognition in an instant, thus involving a much larger audience than a
regular museum show, eventually creating a greater effect.
A definition of format art?
Like the foundation of relational aesthetics, the basis of format art relies on dialogue, collaboration,
and encounter. Nevertheless, a point of criticism, which has been directed towards relational art,
most prominently by art historian Claire Bishop in her article Relational Aesthetics (2004), is that,
despite the desire of relational art to re-humanise a capitalistic world and puncture a hierarchy, it
does not succeed in doing so . There is, Bishop implies, a lack of political engagement in the52
relational art observed by Bourriaud, which makes his selection of artworks incapable of providing
a critical, antagonistic interaction with the public . If we follow Bishop’s criticism, there must be53
some aspect of antagonism present in a work of art in order to establish an effective critical
interrelation with its viewers. And, as examined by Baden, this is exactly what we find in
Geoffroy’s practice. Baden observes how format art often conveys uncomfortable, embarrassing
elements, for instance in the art format Critical Run where the participants are asked to run while
debating about unpopular questions (What are the emergencies today? Is art the last bastion for54
freedom? Are biennales dangerous?) – A quite unpleasant, both physically and mentally exhausting
process. Similarly, the artists and viewers are pushed out of their comfort zones and challenged in
Emergency Room, motivated to produce artworks and debate about their relevance in a constant
flow. One can argue that Emergency Room creates an antagonistic relationship between itself and
ABC News, 2007, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2hWaNGocek, 1:20, (accessed on 1 December 2018)51
Bishop, Claire, ”Antagonism and Relational Aesthetics”, in October, January 1, 2004, p. 65.52
Ibid.53
Baden, p. 133.54
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17. the participants through the uncomfortable or tense relationship between themselves and the
questions and content posed in the artworks out of emergency. Following Bishop’s argumentation,
format art thus seems to be capable of offering an alternative socially engaged practice, which is
sensible to the points of criticism directed towards relational art.
It can be suggested that format art provides a better methodological lens through which to view
social relations to the world and to one another by providing a critical, in Bishop’s terms
antagonistic interaction, as opposed to other works by contemporary artists, which according to
Bourriaud can be considered relational art, that is art that understands itself as an experimental
production of new social relationships – as “the invention of models of sociability” and
“conviviality”. To mention a few examples of these artworks; “Rirkrit Tiravanija organizes a
dinner in a collector’s home, and leaves him all the ingredients required to make a Thai soup.
Philippe Parreno invites a few people to pursue their favorite hobbies on May Day, on a factory
assembly line” . What makes Geoffroy’s art formats differ from these examples is, besides the55
antagonistic interaction (the embarrassment and discomfort of being a participator in an art format,
perhaps even having different viewpoints from other participants), that Geoffroy does not simply
accept the ‘existing real’, being happy to play with the social bond within the constraining frame of
the given. Rather, format art is actually concerned with changing this system of social relations
(capitalism, the structure of the museum, and even apathy) through an interventionist, often comic,
although never cynical, approach . As Gade writes, Geoffroy ‘works performatively using56
interventionist strategies’ and ‘may be accounted an activist artist’ . And as Rosenvinge points out,57
it is furthermore ‘the artist’s intention to create more activists’ . To exemplify, as examined in58
Emergency Room, Geoffroy demonstrates through interventions into the act of exhibition making,
how the museum can consciously work against its own limitations through new ways of
Bourriaud, pp. 7-8.55
Kealy, http://thierrygeoffroy.blogspot.com56
Gade, Rune, ”But His Wife Is Danish – on colonization, being colonized and Colonel”, in Colonel: Avoir L’air, Line57
Rosenvinge and Marita Muukkonen, eds., NIFCA Publications, 2006, p. 58.
Rosenvinge, p. 12.58
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18. constructing exhibitions, in which the artists and viewers are directly engaged. The social and
political content of the day-to-day newly created artworks exhibited in Emergency Room does not
only prepare the ground for immediate critical reflection in the art formats participants inside the
exhibition, but simultaneously strives to encourage long-term change in its audience’s behaviour
and pattern of thought after leaving the exhibition at the museum.
It is to a certain degree possible and inevitable to understand format art in conjunction with
contemporary art practices such as relational aesthetics, as they are both manifested in intangible
acts, rejecting the idea of art as object, proposing new ways of creating social relationships. Both
practices respond to local as well as global contexts focused on the creation of collaborative
processes that develop the consciousness or awareness of the participants. However, the field of
format art calls for a different definition as it operates through different methods and models. First
of all, format art rejects the notion of contemporaneity in favor of the ‘ultracontemporary’, that is
artworks created in and expressing about the ‘now’, thus opening up for an immediate perception of
artworks, even in the context of the museum. Secondly, one can argue that format art and relational
art activate the spectator in different ways. Whereas they both produce an experience, the
experience in the artworks, which respond to Bourriaud’s definition of relational aesthetics, are
enabled by the artists for a small community through the community’s participation. Relational art
can be said to shape the public and use the public itself in doing so. Format art’s focus on process
not only changes the people involved, it changes the world for people unaware of the work. By
creating art formats such as Emergency Room, Geoffroy establishes open and democratic social
structures within the aesthetic realm, offering the possibility of a form of art that initiates social
change to prevent apathy and ultimately future dysfunctions in society. And this is exactly what
format art is all about; putting forward an intellectual, bodily and socially-politically challenging
invitation for co-creation that ‘pushes against the commodity of the spectator and engages the
participants into a challenging, unsettling alertness and awareness’ .59
Sebestyén, http://sebestyenrita.com/before-it-is-too-late/59
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19. References
ABC News, 2007, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2hWaNGocek, 1:20, (accessed on 1
December 2018)
Baden, Sebastian, ”Thierry Geoffroy’s ’Emergency Room’”, in Kunst und Öffentlichkeit, Dagmar
Danko, Olivier Moeschler and Florian Schumacher, eds., Springer VS, 2015.
Birken, Jacob, “’Is the Contemporary Already Too Late?’ (Re-)producing Criticality within the Art
Museum, in Katarzyna Murawska-Muthesius and Piotr Piotrowski (eds.), From Museum Critique to
the Critical Museum, Routledge, 2015, pp. 215-229.
Bishop, Claire, ”Antagonism and Relational Aesthetics”, in October, January 1, 2004.
Bourriaud, Nicolas, Relational Aesthetics, Simon Pleasance and Fronza Woods, trans., Les presses
du réel, 2002 (1998).
DeWille, James, ”Live From N.Y., It’s Yesterday’s News”, on Columbiaspectator.com, 27 March,
2013, https://www.columbiaspectator.com/2007/02/21/live-ny-its-yesterdays-news/ (accessed on 12
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Ferguson, Bruce W.,”Exhibition Rhetorics: Material Speech and Utter Sense”, in Bruce W.
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Friberg, Carsten, ”’Now before it is too late’ – Ultracontemporary art as a response to contemporary
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rmx2s5lhmnetk52cmn2bdzz3ye2zp9 (accessed on 12 October 2018).
Friis, Morten, ”Den dag revolutionen kom forbi”, on Cph-art.dk, 22 May, 2007, http://www.cph-
art.dk/konceptkunst/EmergencyRoom (accessed on 12 October 2018).
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Gade, Rune, ”Et solidt fundament. Kunst og fotografi 1980-2000”, in Mette Sandbye (ed.), Dansk
fotografihistorie, Copenhagen: Gyldendal, 2004, pp. 366-417.
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20. Geoffroy, Thierry, Emergency Room Dictionary, Revolver Publishing by VVV & The Royal Danish
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30 March 2007, p. 11.
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Ratnam, Niru, ”Art and globalisation”, in Themes in Contemporary Art, Gill Perry and Paul Wood,
eds., Yale University Press, 2004.
Rosenvinge, Line, Thierry Geoffroy / Colonel – ”Catalyst.”, David Dunchin, trans. Written and
produced in conjunction with the Top Up salon featuring Thierry Geoffroy / Colonel, held at
Rahbeks Allé 32, Frederiksberg, Denmark, 18 November 2010.
Sebestyén, Rita, ”Before It Is Too Late”, on Sebestyén Rita, 30 May 2016, http://sebestyenrita.com/
before-it-is-too-late/ (accessed 25 September 2018).
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