Dear MoMA PS1,
I am writing to you about a couch. In particular, the couch pictured above. You’ll find it midway through the MoMA PS1 exhibition VITO ACCONCI: WHERE WE ARE NOW (WHO ARE WE ANYWAY?), 1976.
Now, everyone at MoMA PS1 probably has more to think about than a couch, but this couch is very important. I used to think all you needed to screen video art was some comfy seating. That was, until I met your couch.
What we have is a plush, Donald Judd/IKEA-inspired couch. Sounds just great for looking at longform video art. It can be grueling to stand still with locked knees for a 30-minute video; thus, a couch sounds like a great solution.
But look more closely. Where is the art?
And where would a person sit?
Not only does one need to be a stick figure with ostrich-like legs to fit on this couch, the couch faces in a direction away from any art.
That’s right: the couch faces a blank wall.
What you’ll see when looking straight ahead from this couch.
The white cube confronts you. The art has been scattered to the edges of peripheral vision. A couch for a post-art era, if you will.
All said, this couch brings up a long-held problem in video art: despite creative intentions, video art installations rarely give the work justice. To stand or to sit with time-based works is not the only issue. Sometimes videos are shown in a black-box gallery set off to the side of an exhibition, to be exiled from the rest of their exhibition-mates. It can make the work seem overly cinematic. Then there are times when several monitors play together in a single gallery, releasing a squall of competing noises. Showing longform videos on a loop complicates matters, too, when there’s a dozen works shown, and no way to know which work you’re watching. Oh, I guess I’ll come back in an hour or two to see the one video I really want to see!
Basically, watching video art can be much improved with some seating—but never did I think I’d encounter a couch facing a wall in a video art exhibition. It’s okay to put art art in front of a couch.
If that’s not possible, here are some suggestions for putting the couch to good use in the gallery.
Best Regards,
Corinna Kirsch
Turn it into a rest spot.
Push people around the gallery in this couch-on-wheels.
Transform it into a laptop workstation for people who like to type on their stomachs.
Psychoanalysis for dogs
Go Greek.
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