"Something to Talk About," the film and discussion series sponsored by the Friends of Boca Grande Community Center, lived up to billing last week with the showing of "The Artist is Present, "a documentary about performance artist Marina Abramovic.
The product of a highly regimented upbringing by parents who were Yugoslav partisans, Abramovic had a curfew of 10 p.m. until she was 29 years old.
"It's completely insane," she says. "All the cutting myself, whipping myself, burning myself, almost losing my life in the firestar, everything was done before 10 in the evening."
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So much for curfews.
Like her parents in World War II, Abramovic lives on a battlefield. The battlefield is her body.
"Once you enter into the performance state you can push your body to do things you absolutely could never normally do," she said.
Fact Box
Mary Bess is a resident of Boca Grande.
Sir Lawrence Olivier once was asked: "Why do you act?"
He responded, "Look at me! Look at me! Look at me!"
We all feel the need to be regarded. Some will not be denied.
Mirina Abramovic is one of those.
Although her career as a performance artist spans 40 years, she was considered a "fringe" or "alternative" figure.
"But, excuse me, I'm 63!" she says. "I don't want to be alternative anymore!"
When MoMA presented a retrospective of her work, "The Artist is Present," it rescued its cutting-edge reputation and established Abramovic as an icon of the art world.
The centerpiece of the exhibit is mutual regard. From early March until the end of May 2010 she sat in MoMA's atrium within a focused ray of light, all day, every day, receiving museum patrons across the table from her, one at a time, no talking or touching, no overt communication. She said she knew she had hit on the right idea when the thought of it "made me nauseous."
The documentary The Artist is Present is a record of the preparations for the exhibit and of the audience reaction to it. If you think sitting from eight to 12 hours a day sounds like a breeze, reconsider. One's ribs settle into one's hips, the derriere gets sore and the focus wanders.
And what about those necessary bodily functions that must be attended to?
She shows us a chair with a false seat that could accommodate those urges but it doesn't appear as if she used it.
What did she do? It remains a mystery.
At film's end, one is convinced she was engaged in hard work, consistent with the "body as battlefield" theme that infuses her work.
Her objective is to enter a "luminous state" in order to engage in "an energy dialogue" with her partners to achieve her dictum that "performance is life."
The encounter brought tears to the eyes of some, smiles to others and simple acknowledgment from others.
One museum patron quickly stripped off her clothing just before being seated but was hustled off by museum security officers. Upstaging the artist is not permitted.
One wonders what Abramovic would have done were she in the woman's place.
A skeptic in the Boca Grande audience asked, "Are you sure the artist is not mentally ill? Or a con?"
Others asserted she is unquestionably an artist, maybe even a great artist.
You decide.
The Artist Is Present is accessible on the Internet or through the Reference Room at the Boca Grande Community Center.
Is Marina Abromovic an artist? Time will tell.
One thing is certain. Marina Abromovic is an exhibitionist.
Mary Bess is a resident of Boca Grande.
