Being Watched

Yvonne Rainer and the 1960s

Carrie Lambert-Beatty (Assistant Professor, Harvard University)

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QTY:

English

MIT Press
25 February 2011

Individual actors & performers; Choreography

Series: Being Watched

"How Yvonne Rainer's art shaped new ways of watching as well as performing; how it connected 1960s avant-garde art to politics and activism. In her dance and performances of the 1960s, Yvonne Rainer famously transformed the performing body-stripped it of special techniques and star status, traded its costumes and leotards for T-shirts and sneakers, asked it to haul mattresses or recite texts rather than leap or spin. Without discounting these innovations, Carrie Lambert-Beatty argues in Being Watched that the crucial site of Rainer's interventions in the 1960s was less the body of the performer than the eye of the viewer-or rather, the body as offered to the eye. Rainer's art, Lambert-Beatty writes, is structured by a peculiar tension between the body and its display. Through close readings of Rainer's works of the 1960s-from the often-discussed dance Trio A to lesser-known Vietnam war-era protest dances-Lambert-Beatty explores how these performances embodied what Rainer called ""the seeing difficulty."" (As Rainer said- ""Dance is hard to see."") Viewed from this perspective, Rainer's work becomes a bridge between key episodes in postwar art. Lambert-Beatty shows how Rainer's art (and related performance work in Happenings, Fluxus, and Judson Dance Theater) connects with the transformation of the subject-object relation in minimalism and with emerging feminist discourse on the political implications of the objectifying gaze. In a spectacle-soaked era, moreover-when images of war played nightly on the television news-Rainer's work engaged the habits of viewing formed in mass-media America, linking avant-garde art and the wider culture of the 1960s. Rainer is significant, argues Lambert-Beatty, not only as a choreographer, but as a sculptor of spectatorship.

How Yvonne Rainer's art shaped new ways of watching as well as performing; how it connected 1960s avant-garde art to politics and activism. In her dance and performances of the 1960s, Yvonne Rainer famously transformed the performing body-stripped it of special techniques and star status, traded its costumes and leotards for T-shirts and sneakers, asked it to haul mattresses or recite texts rather than leap or spin. Without discounting these innovations, Carrie Lambert-Beatty argues in Being Watched that the crucial site of Rainer's interventions in the 1960s was less the body of the performer than the eye of the viewer-or rather, the body as offered to the eye. Rainer's art, Lambert-Beatty writes, is structured by a peculiar tension between the body and its display. Through close readings of Rainer's works of the 1960s-from the often-discussed dance Trio A to lesser-known Vietnam war-era protest dances-Lambert-Beatty explores how these performances embodied what Rainer called ""the seeing difficulty."" (As Rainer said- ""Dance is hard to see."") Viewed from this perspective, Rainer's work becomes a bridge between key episodes in postwar art. Lambert-Beatty shows how Rainer's art (and related performance work in Happenings, Fluxus, and Judson Dance Theater) connects with the transformation of the subject-object relation in minimalism and with emerging feminist discourse on the political implications of the objectifying gaze. In a spectacle-soaked era, moreover-when images of war played nightly on the television news-Rainer's work engaged the habits of viewing formed in mass-media America, linking avant-garde art and the wider culture of the 1960s. Rainer is significant, argues Lambert-Beatty, not only as a choreographer, but as a sculptor of spectatorship."

By: Carrie Lambert-Beatty (Assistant Professor Harvard University)
Imprint: MIT Press
Country of Publication: United States
Edition: 1
Dimensions: Height: 229mm, Width: 178mm, Spine: 17mm
Weight: 794g
ISBN: 9780262516075
ISBN 10: 0262516071
Series: Being Watched
Pages: 384
Publication Date: 25 February 2011
Recommended Age: From 18 years
Audience: College/higher education , Professional and scholarly , A / AS level , Further / Higher Education
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

Carrie Lambert-Beatty is Assistant Professor in the Department of History of Art and Architecture and the Department of Visual and Environmental Studies at Harvard University.

Reviews for Being Watched: Yvonne Rainer and the 1960s

The book is a fantastic read and an exemplary text...a highly original analysis, this study is sure to become a classic. -MJ Thompson, TDR: The Drama Review

Winner of <PrizeName>Honorable Mention, Music and the Performing Arts category, 2008 PROSE Awards presented by the Professional/Scholarly Publishing Division of the Association of American Publishers</PrizeName> 2008
Winner of <PrizeName>Winner, 2009 de la Torre Bueno Book Prize presented by the Society of Dance History Scholars (SDHS)</PrizeName> 2008
Winner of Honorable Mention, Music and the Performing Arts category, 2008 PROSE Awards presented by the Professional/Scholarly Publishing Division of the Association of American Publishers 2008
Winner of Honorable Mention, Music and the Performing Arts category, 2008 PROSE Awards presented by the Professional/Scholarly Publishing Division of the Association of American Publishers</PrizeName> 2008
Winner of Winner, 2009 de la Torre Bueno Book Prize presented by the Society of Dance History Scholars (SDHS)</PrizeName> 2008