Ideas

The statement of ‘Context is everything’ is quite a problematic idea. When visiting an exhibition and viewing an art piece, context is a valuable and important aspect in understanding the particular work. Different possibilities of context arises such as the social, cultural, institutional and physical aspects of a piece of work. These categories of context make up a substantial understanding of an art piece but it is quite interesting to think of them in relation to each other and which context is more pronounced than the other. Furthermore different practises in art lend itself more to using context as its crux but there is quite an interesting debate in ethnic artists using context in their work. In this essay I will be outlaying several arguments for and against for the idea of ‘Context is everything’ using references from books and exhibition visits.

I am going to start with discussing about site specific installation artworks in relation to context. In Miwon Kwon’s One Place after Another, she deals with site specific art and locational identity. The problematics of using this type of art is that the work is installed into a specific location and from that, the space is included within its structure and understanding. This makes the piece more pronounced as visitors have a limited duration to see the piece of work within its environment as most installation artworks are destroyed afterwards. The work is read within the context of the space it’s in, cultural implications of the space as well as its time. Context in this particular case is quite important as replications or documentations through photographs are not substantial enough than seeing it in its actual space. The presence and relational aesthetics to the piece needs to be gained through walking through the installation and responding to it on a much more physical interaction. In this case, physical context of the space and its relationship are quite important in making judgemental decisions on the artists intentions.

Specifically though, I was quite interested in site specific installations by ethnic artists dealing with themes of culture, identity, displacement and Diaspora. It seems to be quite interesting how certain themes lend themselves more successfully using certain mediums and how you think of context in these terms. My own practise is developing into using site specific art to highlight ideas of displacement and being rooted within a specific place or home. The fact that the fragility and temporality of the piece of work in this context is so prominent that it lends itself to the ideas of the piece even after the work is destroyed.

The history and context of the artist is quite a prominent feature in a piece of art as well. Chinese artist Yin Xiuzhen made a grand installation called ‘Portable City’ in 2003 out of suitcases, clothes and cement (Fig 1). She places a series of suitcases within the gallery space, unzipped and towering buildings made out of clothes and cement fills up the space in abundance. Of course these ideas are from the political and social contexts of the Chinese born artist. The vast development of the Chinese economy has no doubt been an area of concern to the artist and she is developing a practise surrounding the idea of displacement and the idea of portability (relating to the idea of Diaspora).  

Fig 1: Yin Xinzhen, Portable City View 1, 2003, Suitcase installation, clothes, cement

These installations however are placed within the context of the gallery space. Although this makes it less problematic in the sense that the surrounding space is not the main issue, having the suitcases shown within the United Kingdom when the artist is of Chinese descent and exploring the theme of displacement and Diaspora, this makes context seem quite substantial although it’s open to discussion if it’s ‘everything’.

Continuing on from the context of the artist and their situation, there is a large debate surrounding cultural diversity policies and discussions with ‘ethnic artists’ about their practises and intentions. From this cultural diversity debate at the Whitechapel Gallery and hearing from Bonnie Greer from the discussion panel, it was revealing to find out the presumptions of ethnic art history not being totally represented within mainstream ‘white’ art history. This would provide a misleading context for ethnic artists born and practising within the United Kingdom who are responding to the themes of identity through looking at ‘western’ art perspectives. From this I mean that in order for ethnic artists to relate and understand works of art that may be more ‘relatable’ to them is by having accurate historical records of all artists. It becomes even more so problematic when looking at the ideas of trans-national identity and as Bonnie Greer stated within the debate, we are moving towards a ‘non western multi polar world’. Within the social context of a piece of work in this sense, its steps into a completely complex but rich arena for discourse about the importance of context within a piece of work. Furthermore the ‘Third text reader’ by Rasheed Araeen and Richard Dyer is an important resource for challenging received notions of art practise and art history.

The second idea for the statement ‘context is everything’ relates to the idea of the art work’s meaning and whether it may be changed once its put into a stereotypical gallery space- stark, white walled, commercial and hierarchical. I recently went to the Suki Chan exhibition at Tin Type gallery. Her large video installations have been scaled down and condensed into single film stills. After seeing the work and speaking to her I couldn’t help but think the pieces of work became a commodity and commercialised. The large immersive video pieces have been reduced in scale and I thought compromised the main ideas of the piece- or maybe it was the case that there wasn’t enough physical space to display the work or they wanted to make it smaller so it could sell. Even so, it is quite interesting to think of our understanding of what art is. Where a particular piece of work is placed such as a gallery space, lends itself to thinking it is a piece of art.

In relation to this, American artist Kara Walker exposes the use of the traditional white wall gallery. Her simple and stark stencil installations tell the visual history of the African slavery Diaspora (Fig 2). Notice in fig 2 that the work on the left is installed on the galleries wall. In this case, you could also read it as a site specific installation as using the white gallery space intervenes with the ideas and discussions the artist is making about slavery, power and black & white cultural histories. The piece on the right however is framed within a large blank case. From this, I can only presume she is making a comment upon portraiture, black history and being boxed into a certain inescapable space. Also artist Rirkrit Tiravanija in his installation within the gallery space in which he invited visitors and members of the public to make a meal using the available foods in the gallery space. By exploring the social relationships with people and the art, Tiravanija opens up a dialogue between the use of the gallery space, how people interact and the problems with consumerism and materiality. His work has been showcasing Bourriad’s concept of relational art i.e. involving the visitors, allowing them to communicate and interpret art real time.

Fig 2: Kara Walker with installations

Context as everything as a statement seems too far on the scale to be taken literally. Of course context is a very substantial and important area to understand a piece of work but it does not mean ‘everything’. Other considerations include the form, space, shape, colour and materiality of the piece of work. The overriding importance of the piece of work may be mainly its theme, point of address or intention rather than its social or political context. However there are possibilities of a piece of art taking its political context into the fray with art activists such as Ai Wei Wei. His recent ‘Sunflower seeds’ commission at Tate Modern reveals an activist who is deeply rooted within Chinese politics and uses art as a means of communication to address underlying issues in contemporary china. The 100 million hand crafted sunflower seeds fill up the turbine hall of Tate Modern creating a landscape and confrontation of themes of mass consumption, identity within the masses and the cultural and economic shifts happening today. In this case, art activists engage with the political times of this generation and context is a huge part of its discussion. 

                                Fig 3: Ai Wei Wei, Sunflower Seeds, 2010

However context is ‘everything’ is too big a statement to conclude as different categories of context actually make up the ‘substantial’. In this I mean the main key within the artwork. Take Ai Wei Wei’s work for example. Political context being the main key to understanding the work so there are varying limits to how context aids meaning- it is not the be all or end all of art.