Art, Politics, Windows and Rifles

Gerald Raunig’s “transversal concatenation” theory delineates the interaction between art and political activism in contemporary socio-aesthetic practices. Despite the overlaps and transitions between art and politics, he argues that their distinct identities will always be maintained. Nikos Papastergiadis paraphrases “they are both discrete fields that rest on the same terrain.” Instead of fusion, according to Raunig, there exists an essential 'shuttling' between the two. As part of his argument he draws on particular genres of art, including conceptual, community and site-specific art.

During research for my essay on site-specific art I came across an artwork by Gordon Matta-Clark that in retrospect really demonstrates Raunig’s ideas.

During the late 1970’s Gordon Matta-Clark was a young sculptor engaging in ‘subtractive’ practices: cutting away sections of abandoned buildings. These works, often in collaboration with friends, were for the most part unauthorized. In 1976 he was given the opportunity to conduct such work with the sanction of an institution. Along with a handful of other high-profile architects Matta-Clark was invited to contribute to a New York exhibition at the Institute for Architecture and Urban Studies called Idea as Model. His proposed installation was approved by the curator. Thomas Crow (in a chapter on site-specific art in Modern Art in the Common Culture) describes how Matta-Clark’s work aimed to “expose a limited, existing space by cutting out square sections of a seminar room clad in windowless sheetrock, opening it up to the rest of the building; the removed pieces were to be stacked inside the room.”

However, late in the installation process Matta-Clark sporadically altered this conception. In each window he placed a photograph of a new housing project in the Bronx in which windows had already been smashed out. Recognizing the artist’s ploy, the curator allowed Matta-Clark to break several of the Institute's windows (that were already cracked). However at 3am that morning Matta-Clark returned with an air rifle and shot through them all.

In this work Matta-Clark employed both aesthetic and activist strategies to address his concerns for the poor conditions of local housing. Yet, as Raunig argues, the distinction between the two fields is preserved. Matta-Clark translates this idea literally through the separation of time. From day to night he 'shuttled' between artist and activist.