An exercise in Relational Aesthetics - The Ordinary Collective's It Just Leaves Me with an Empty Feeling

In the section Relation Form (the chapter preceding this week's reading) in Relational Aesthetics Nicholas Bourriaud makes explicit the central notion of 'dialogue' to the work of art. For Bourriaud this dimension of dialogue is what gives form its 'productive status' and situates it in the realm of an 'encounter'.

At the recent Underbelly Arts Festival at Fraser Studios, Sydney based group The Ordinary Collective sought to address the issue of the disatisfying 'coldness' of many such encounters, particularly in relation to digital art. Artists Tega Brain, Cady Brain, and Brendan Phelan assembled what at first appeared to be brightly coloured living room, complete with various armchairs, rugs, and other furnishings, within the studios. Relaxing into one of the supplied armchairs on opening night, the viewer faced a TV set showing an analogue test pattern. On second glance it became apparent to the reclining viewer that the 'test pattern' was in fact an aerial shot of the 'living room' filmed from a video camera suspended from the ceiling and playd back in real time, the various coloured furnishings supplying the test pattern of which it was now apparent the viewer featured.