Den framställande gesten : Om konstverkets presentation i den moderna konstutställningen

Abstract

The Gesture of Exposure On the presentation of the work of art in the modern art exhibition The topic of this dissertation is the presentation of art works in the modern art exhibition as being the established and conventionalized form of art encounter. It investigates the possibility of a theorization of the art exhibition as a separate object for research, and attempts to examine the relationship between the art work and its presentation in a modern art exhibition. The study takes its point of departure in the area vaguely defined as exhibition studies, and in the lack of a general problematization of the analytical tools used for closer examination of the modern art exhibition. Another lacking aspect is a closer consideration of what happens to the work of art when it is exposed in an art exhibition. The aim of the dissertation is to find a set of concepts that can be used for further theorization The art exhibition is here treated, on the one hand, as an act of exposure, as a showing gesture. On the other hand, the art exhibition is seen as a spatiality, as a space that is produced in the act of showing. Both aspects are seen to be intimately involved in knowledge production. The dissertation is divided into four parts, in which different aspects of the art exhibition are analyzed using different theoretical approaches. The first part uses the archaeological model of Michel Foucault, and discusses the exhibition as a discursive formation based on communicative activity. The second part analyses the derived concepts of gesture and space. This leads to the proposition of three metaphorical spatialities – the frame, the agora and the threshold – which are seen as providing a possibility for a further extension of the theory of exhibitions. The third part extends the problematization of the relationship between the individual work of art and its exposure through the ideas of Walter Benjamin and Maurice Blanchot. The fourth part carries out a close reading of three presentations from the modern era in order to further examine the relationship between the work of art and its presentation, using the tools that have been developed during the study. In the concluding section, it is possible to see clearer borderlines and conditions for the development of an exhibition theory. The concepts that have been analysed and developed into tools are shown to be useful, and the examples take the discussion into a consideration of the altered premises for the encounter with the postmodern work of art.

Konstutställningen har under modernismen blivit den främsta platsen för våra möten med konst. Även i postmodern tid söker vi kunskap, upplevelser och nöje i just utställda verk. Denna dynamiska plats är central för vår uppfattning av vad konsten är och kan vara.

Maria Hirvi-Ijäs avhandling fokuserar på konstutställningen som plats men även på utställandet som en retorisk gest i kommunikationen om, genom och med konst. Det moderna konstverket blir här en aktör som är i samspel med både betraktaren och utställningens form.

Avhandlingen ger en inblick i den moderna konsthistoriens och -teorins centrala frågeställningar samtidigt som den öppnar upp för nya förståelser om och insikter i konstens betydelse i vår kultur.

Maria Hirvi-Ijäs (f. 1962) är nytillträdd rektor vid Bildkonstakademin i Helsingfors samt professor i konstens teori och idéhistoria vid Kungliga konsthögskolan i Stockholm. Tidigare har hon arbetat som utställningscurator vid Museet för nutidskonst Kiasma i Helsingfors. Hon har publicerat konstkritik och essäer sedan början av 1990-talet, och är kolumnist på Hufvudstadsbladet.