LOS ANGELES – Austrian conceptual artist VALIE EXPORT engages with the concrete of an urban landscape as if it were a playground. In his “photographic” series Body configurations (1972–76), bends, folds and stretches across the infrastructure of a seemingly desolate city, his body merging with the architecture of a built environment.
The MAK Art and Architecture Center installs several photographs and two videos from this series at the Schindler House. VALIE EXPORT: Embodied, director of the center, Jia Yi Gu, curator. In these works, EXPORT heightens people’s instinct to disobey a built environment. In public parks, pedestrians can shun walking paths in favor of more direct shortcuts across the grass, carving “desire lines” into the dirt with their feet; or they can punch a hole in a chain-link fence as they search for a straight path between public and private property.
For the most part, EXPORT agrees with the small and playful commitment to urban planning disobedience. In the picture “Einkreisung” (1976)., the artist lying on the ground, stretches his body in a convex shape to embrace the curves of a bright red ribbon, while in the Super 8 film, “Adjungierte Dislokationen / [Adjunct Dislocations]” (1973), he took two steps around the perimeter of a sidewalk. Its limited movement reminded me of the people in the amusement park simulation game Rollercoaster Tycoon, who can only step on the shapes of a walkway.
Some images, however, are surprising. For “DER MENSCH ALS ORNAMENT” (1976) he folds his body forward, perched on the A-frame of a wooden storage container built into the pavement. Her limp figure, hair fluttering against her outstretched hands, creates an unsettling sense of helplessness, but the street is empty, with no one to discover a rag doll of a woman.
With this image, EXPORT’s urban interventions warn us of the dangers of being read as a woman in a highly visible public space. The spectacle of her feminine body opens up the possibility of harassment, like the common cat call or more serious acts of physical violence.
Six performance artists from Los Angeles were invited to respond to EXPORT’s interventions in the performance program In their Image on March 23, curator Chloë Flores. With “SURGE,” Lara Salmon strapped herself into a muscle stimulator and allowed people to control the current of electricity running through her body. He lay with his legs against the wall, positioning himself as a vulnerable target, open to abuse. Another performance, “Minotaur,” starring Emily Lucid alongside Kyle Patrick Roberts, reenacted the Greek myth of Hercules and the Minotaur as a trans feminist love story. Hercules, played by Lucid, has embraced, rejected, and re-embraced the beast, pointing to the volatile landscape of transgender people in society.
EXPORT staged its series more than 40 years ago, but it came up with answers In their Image artists show that little has changed for women’s bodies in urban environments. With that in mind, the EXPORTS Body configurations they are transgressive actions. They show a woman taking up as much space as she can, without fear of how she is perceived.
VALIE EXPORT: Embodied Continues at the MAK Center for Art and Architecture, Schindler House (835 North Kings Road, West Hollywood, California) through April 7. The exhibition was organized by MAK Center Director Jia Yi Gu with Seymour Polatin, Brian Taylor and Maeve Atkinson.
