Beatriz A. Medeiros
1. Introduction
In august 2015, the American musician Amanda Palmer posed in front of the
New York Public Library, naked, covered only by body painting, 8 months pregnant
and with the purpose of collect children's books for the New Yorker institution. The
moment the performance happened, who didn't recognize Palmer's artistic figure may
have been somewhat confused. However, the singer shows herself as relatively famous
not only for controversial appearances1, but also supporting free access to art2, female
rights and just because she felt that was the right thing to do 3. Nevertheless, it's not the
first time Amanda Palmer gets naked in front a large crowd and it doesn't seem to affect
the artist as it affects the mass media4 or the critics5.
The flashier performances executed by Palmer always are followed by very
interesting responses. This can happen because of the high aesthetic value, or the
constant questioning around the artist, if what she does is art or not as it seems to be
"too easy" or "too accessible"6. However, I intend to analyze this particular
performance, since it seems to be forged differently from what Palmer's fans find
themselves accustomed. Other than anterior cases, Amanda Palmer reported all the
process that transformed her at the human version of Damien Hirst's statue, Verity, in
her blog7 and at her Patreon page8.
Before I deepen the artistic subject, it is important to contextualize the moment
in which the artist opt to create such performance, and further on the relevance of this
event as a setting factor for Palmer as an independent performer artist, even if it doesn't
involved music creation.
1
"Amanda Palmer: Naked & Dead at the Golden Globes", article published at The Huffington Post. Link:
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lee-stranahan/amanda-palmer-naked-dead_b_429343.html>,
last
access:
08/30/2016.
2
"Amanda
Palmer's
Dopey Topless
Protest",
article
published
at LA
Weekly.
Link:
<http://www.laweekly.com/music/amanda-palmers-dopey-topless-protest-nsfw-2399141>, last access: 08/30/2016.
3
"Amanda Palmer: How to drink with your fans", article published at New Statesman. Link:
<http://www.newstatesman.com/2013/10/drinking-your-fans>, last access: 08/30/2016.
4
"Making a boob of herself! Amanda Palmer's breast escapes her bra as she performs on stage at Glastonbury",
article published at Daily Mail. Link: <http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2351373/Making-boobAmanda-Palmers-breast-escapes-bra-performs-stage-Glastonbury.html>, last access: 08/30/2016.
5
"Amanda
Palmer:
Naked
and
Hairy!",
post
at
the
blog
Grimy
Goods.
Link:
<http://www.grimygoods.com/2009/07/16/amanda-palmer-naked-and-hairy/>, lat access: 09/01/2016.
6
"Amanda Palmer: 'this is the future of music'", post at the blog Insp. Link: <http://insp.ngo/amanda-palmer-this-isthe-future-of-music/>, last access: 09/01/2016.
7
At: <http://amandapalmer.net/truth-and-consequences/>, last access: 09/01/2016.
8
At: <https://www.patreon.com/amandapalmer>, last access: 09/17/2016.
replicated and executed several times, creating patterns that will be named by Schechner
as "restored behavior", or twice experienced (2002). This is one of the many definitions
to answer the questions "What is a performance?" However, I understand performance
as more than repeated or ritualized actions.
Still inside the light of Richard Schechner (2006), we see a differentiation
between two looks towards performance, the "as" and the "is". Deepening these two
terms, he explains that ""Is" performance refers to events defined and connected,
marked by a context, a convention, an use and tradition" (SCHECHNER, 2006, 69),
whereas everything can be understood "as" performance, that is performance can be
seen as a execution process that involves bodies, meanings and emotions transmission.
For Schechner, this kind of performance has artistic and cultural values that can't be
ignored and that is a part of a social construction. Performance is present inside
universal cultural logic, even if applied differently in distinct regions and populations.
The Brazilian researcher and performer Renato Cohen (2002) agrees with
Schechner theory that reads performance as a process. As Cohen writes, performance art
shows itself, before all, as an "scenic expression" (COHEN, 2002, 28), which means
that it is related with the artist body, how she shows herself to the public, the way she
pass a message. The performance is structured as scenic art, or art that happens as
spectacle, that necessarily involves artists, its body, distinguishing from other lines of
work, like visual arts. Cohen (2002) sees the performance art differently from
Schechner vision. In appearances like happenings or theatricality, the author agrees that
human and cultural values are lost when necessary. These kind of breaks are important
because will antagonize to current social impositions such as mass media and art
capitalization.
"A mdia, representada pelos chamados "meios de comunicao" e pela propaganda, se
encarrega de transformar qualquer movimento esttico-filosfico em moda e,
conseqentemente, capitalizar em cima dele." (COHEN, 2002, p. 152).
"The means of communication, represented by the so called "media" and propaganda, is
responsible to transform any movement philosophical-aesthetic in fashion, and, thereafter,
capitalize on them." (COHEN, 2002, p. 152)
Renato Cohen sees the mass media and the capitalism as the principal villains to
artistic creativity, because the system segment what must be produced, how it should be
produced and who can consume and how to consume. Artistic performance has the
functions to come upon these conventions.
two
platforms
that
Image 3: Three comments of fans about Patreon and money usage made by Amanda Palmer
The three comments replicated at Image 3 also are relevant for demonstrating
public acceptance about the usage Palmer makes with the money patrons provide her
and that were used to create the acting performance of human Verity. However, these
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Palmer, in this moment, searches the explanation for what she understands in
being a motivation that guides independent artists, the desire to be seen and believed.
16
The desire in being authentic. However, how can an artist mostly an independent17
one can be seen as authentic, something real?
When referring to modern individuals, Charles Taylor (1991) will affirm that
authenticity is obtained when a subject decides to listen to its own "inner voice"
(TAYLOR, 1991, 29) that states the particular moral concept of the particular person,
even if not necessarily connected with the general social moral. This, for the author, is
the only way to reach the true human state, for the individual to get in touch with its
own qualities, not dictated by third parts. In other words, reach the authenticity stage in
its fullness.
Accord to the researcher San Kaluarachchi (2015), authenticity is intrinsically
connected to the quantity of experiences and personal information a musician put in her
own compositions. To Allan Moore (2002) authenticity goes beyond personal accounts.
It is tangled with historic and cultural constructions, providing its significance more by
the audience understanding then by lyrical compositions of a song, for example.
However, I also see as important the supposition that Amanda Palmer uses to
nominate her work as authentic, real, true. As the quoted before, the artist writes in her
book, I presume that all or almost all performances staged by her are created with
the goal of entice faith in the audience. Making the public pay how much it wants, for
what it wants, as it happens in the website Patreon, was a resource found by the
American singer to show her performances and compositions are real and are a part of
her own.
Thus my understanding resemble Kaluarachchi's notion (2015), the level of
personal content between artist and production is one of the most important factors to
measure the authenticity of certain artist. This measure, however, isn't easy scaled,
because it evolves the complexity of subjectivity and identity construction of the artist
(MOORE, 2002; TAYLOR, 1991). Besides, the relation of the audience will have with
the musician, at this case, is also very important, after all someone has to name the artist
as an authentic subject. The donator of the "gift" of truth will be, to be exact, the ones
that see the persona that wishes to be seen, the audience critics, fans and media.
Amanda Palmer searches all the time to being seen and believed, be
acknowledge as someone authentic, that produces true art. The performance adapted by
her of Damien Hirst's work of art shows an interesting illustration of what the singer
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I understand that any artist is truly independent. She always will depend in her public, for example, to sell her
creations. Artists I called by independent are those that doesn't see themselves connected to big music labels or
records, musicians that produce and promote their creations without the help of majors.
wishes to mean. For such reading, notice the Image 5, Verity, the work chosen by
Amanda Palmer and Image 6, the artist's rereading.
The copper version of Verity was described by its creator as a work of art that
should inspires justice and truth. The sculpture was made to substitute an old one, of a
pregnant native, located in the Coast city of Ilfracombe, Devon, England, ordered to
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attract tourists to the location18. The pregnant woman is divided in the middle, showing
one dissected side, with her internal organs and baby in the venter out in the open,
besides she proudly raises a sword, caring herself with safety and haughtiness, as a
figure without fear of exposing her most intimate and fragile side. All these
characteristics stimulate a sensation of authenticity and veracity, in which Amanda
Palmer says to base her work, expressing to her audience her intimacy through her
compositions.
In her book, Palmer (2015) affirms that she uses contents of her personal life in
the process of production of her songs, as a way to prove she's real, that she passes to
situations similar with the ones of her fans daily. She also uses her Twitter 19 account to
talk about the happenings in her routine and claimed that the fans responses inspire
several responses of fans, that helped her with different lyrical creations.
In an optimistic sense, I see Palmer as Verity, proud and haughty, but still open
to the public eye. With her conflicts and humanity exposed to be seen, criticized,
supported and praised for whom she aims as target Audience or for the critics. The
selection of such sculpture seemed to be well received inside Palmer's fan base, the fact
of being pregnant while she performed as human statue created different impact
reactions, but the legitimization of something real was happening, as observed in
comments at the Images 7 and 8.
See
the
interview
with
Hirst
to
North
Devon
Gazette:
<http://www.northdevongazette.co.uk/news/hirst_lifts_the_lid_on_verity_1_1651052>, last access: 09/17/2016.
19
https://twitter.com/amandapalmer, last access: 09/25/2016.
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Dali's quote, remembered by the fan at Image 7. There's also legitimization towards
Palmer's production of art, with the justification of being an inspiration to other artists,
because she produces art with "courage", accord to the commentary of the fan at Image
8, that has an interesting speech place, since she's an
Amanda's performance, validating her own theory. This legitimization, even if not
academically theorized, shows all practical sentiments rising around Palmer and her
productions, by the audience paying ones or not.
4. Conclusion
This paper tried to understand if ways of non usual financial revenues, having as
representation the website Patreon, to a certain small group of artists are valid,
especially when dealing with issues concerning artist's legitimization as an authentic
being. I used the musician Amanda Palmer, because she seems to offer significant
influence regarding the use of new tools, like Social Network Sites and crowdfunding to
mobilize her fanbase and prompt them to support her. Besides, the artist sold as a
"Thing" an auto exposition, a human statue, naked and while eight months pregnant.
The action happened to collect books for the New York Public Library, but it also
worked as a promotion of herself.
Minding Renato Cohen's theory that says that art decodes the truth (2002, 63), I
searched to understand the existence of Amanda Palmer's authenticity legitimization, in
which she reaffirms to have and include all her creations, I analyzed the aesthetic choice
the artist made by interpreting Verity of Damien Hirst and the response of the audience
that saw her production as a performer.
I noticed and discussed the importance of the impact factor for performances,
mainly the ones that has a goal to draw attention for a cause bigger than the artistic
universe. Palmer didn't made art for art, because she had an objective of making people
donate books to the children's wing at the New York Public Library, with the
justification to facilitate the access of poorer kids to reading. The artist published a text
in her blog with an explanation about her performance. In the text there's a list citing
reasons to value the stimulus of interest to reading in the first infancy, besides some sort
of statistics of how many children has access to books in the United States. There's also
an open link to the NYPL's website, in case anyone wants to donate books after reading
about Palmer's performance.
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The impact of this performance, theoretically, was important so that other people
tried to understand about the cause promoted by the artist. I didn't have access to the
necessary numbers to affirm that Palmer's action was actually effective, however the
intention exists and can influence other forms of art that involves similar causes.
Next, I discussed the importance of authenticity that promotes visibility to
artists, especially independent ones. I noticed that were certain legitimization of
Amanda Palmer's performance from the fans. This legitimization offer a tone of
authenticity on what Amanda is producing and serving in ways of nontraditional
financial revenues, but that has a crescent utilization inside the independent artistic and
musical scene. To this fans, it makes sense to pay for a performance made by Palmer,
because it inspires, is part of a "just cause" and, more importantly, represents what the
singer speaks several times. The performance is a representation of herself, what
generates some sort of affection towards her fans when they watch her executing it.
Renato Cohen (2002) understands artistic capitalization as something negative,
however Amanda Palmer shows that an artist needs to earn money to live and execute
her artistic productions. Seeing we are inserted in a logical world capital, the usage of
ways that allows people pay how much they want for a work of art and an artist, seems
like a more democratic measure, an alternative for a capitalization that obliges certain
consume for certain types of public. An artist produces what she wants, audience
consumes what it wants.
The fact that Amanda Palmer has taken the project as something more personal
than the books collection doesn't seemed to have bothered the audience. Maybe this
have occurred, because the artist relates the whole process for the elaboration of the
performance in her blog. She seems more worried in being seen then to promote a social
action, still this only brings her closer to the classical performing artists that constructed
themselves the same way. To be paid for it it's only a way of artistic capitalization, as it
happens in the music itself.
3. References
CARROLL, Nel. Beyond Aesthetics: Philosophical Essays. Cambridge University
Press, 2003.
COHEN, Renato. Performance como linguagem. Criao de um Tempo-Espao de
experimentao. So Paulo: Editora Perspectiva, 2002.
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KALUARACHCHI, San Andrew Graham. 'Drawn to Those Ones that Ain't Afraid':
Authenticity and Authorship in the Laurel Canyon Singer-songwriter Scene. In:
KRGER, Simone; MOY, Ron (org). Popscript Volume II: Graduate Research in
Popular Music. North Caroline: Lulu Press, 2015.
MOORE, Allan. Authenticity as Authentication. In: Popular Music, n 2, vol 21.
Cambridge University Press, 2002. pp. 209-223.
PALMER, A. A Arte de Pedir. Traduo: Denise Bottmann. 1 ed. Rio de Janeiro:
Intrnseca, 2015.
ROCHA, Susana de Noronha Vasconcelos Teixeira da. Berna Reale: a importncia do
choque e do silncio na performance. In: Revista Estdio: Artistas sobre Outras Obras,
vol 5, n 9, 2014. pp. 22-30.
SCHECHNER, Richard. O que performance? In: Performance Studies: an
Introduction. New York e London: Routledge, 2006. pp. 28-51.
TAYLOR, Charles. The Sources of Authenticity. In: The Ethics of Authenticity.
London: Harvard University Press, 1991. pp. 25-29.
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