In a fit of now infamous madness the artist Vincent Van Gogh cut off his ear. In a state of supposed sanity the UK-based conceptual body artist Stelarc is currently in the process of having a genetically engineered ear grown with the aim of having it surgically grafted onto his own arm as a piece of permanent performance art.
The body as canvas? Has this become performance art for the new millenium?
Ideals of female and male beauty have changed countless times over the centuries, and more often than not, the medium of art has been a catalyst for these evolving cultural ideals. The philosopher Socrates maintained that the main task of the artist was to give a standard idealised contour of the human body in exact proportions, so as to gain ‘Balance and Harmony’. Whilst Leonardo Da Vinci’s ‘Vitruvian Man‘ set the standard for physical beauty and perfection for centuries. Yet, one wonders what these illustrious gentlemen would make of the lengths to which these ideals have been taken in the 21st century.
Visual Artists have long focused on the exploration of the body in painting and sculpture – it has always been the greatest muse. Theatre and dance have also used the body as their principle expressive medium. And mediums such as photography, film, video, and increasingly the Internet and cyberspace, have consistently been used to explore contemporary themes inspired by ever changing cultural perspectives of the body.
The practice of affecting change to the body as a form of artistic expression is clearly nothing new. Tattooing linked historically to deviance and once considered to be the sole domain of sailors, bikers and criminals, has, in recent times, gained increased recognition as a legitimate art form. And following in this recategorisation – so too body piercing, scarification and branding are no longer considered a cry for psychiatric assistance. With all the cultural and tribal connotations they once entailed, these practices have become common examples of means in which many people strive to find a greater understanding of themselves both spiritually and creatively.
Through the crafting of their physical appearance, we are now turning a body of art into the body as art.
Perhaps one of the more illuminating examples of the ‘self-crafting’ phenomenon in modern times has been the increasing popularity of the so-called ‘art’ of plastic surgery. Cultural theorists have also bought into the debate, with the argument that this trend is related to something profoundly cultural, and that throughout much of the 20th century the relationship between the body and technology has fused closer together. It seems medical intervention, for lack of a better term, has become the new Da Vinci. And this new master offers us the ability to realize our dreams of physical perfection in ways which were once unavailable, yet are now more and more prevalent with breakthroughs in medical technology.
Have we come full circle? Is it our own physical renaissance we are discovering in this ‘self-crafting’? And are we perpetuating the model of a De Medici-style benafactor/dependent artisan in this new evolutionary relationship between plastic surgeon and patient.
Shows like the fictitious nip/tuck and the all too real Extreme Makeover are perfect examples of this dramatic social change. Anyone familiar with the latter program will be more than familiar with the process in which individuals with seemingly ‘normal’ bodies but seemingly fragile psyches, undergo what amounts to enormous and not risk free amounts of supposedly ‘life changing’ surgery. In many ways this carnival of the grotesque is a larger than life piece of performance art; one where the paintbrush is replaced with a scalpel and the canvas with malleable and eagerly willing flesh.
Going one step further, one of the most visible proponents of this surgery-as-artform phenomenon is the French performance artist known simply as Orlan. Starting with her first operation in May 1990 Orlan has had numerous subsequent surgeries with the intention of transforming herself into an idealized version of the ‘perfect woman’. In striving to incorporate aspects of the images of Venus, Diana, Europa, Psyche and the Mona Lisa, her numerous surgeries attempt to reconstruct the traditional aesthetics of female beauty. Under the banner of what she terms ‘carnal art’ her surgeries are televised, with the operating theatre lavishly decorated and often featuring live music – and she is fully conscious throughout. Taking the audience step-by-step through the process and often performing readings while her features are manipulated with scalpels and lasers, most recently having two ridges of bone inserted beneath her temples resulting in a look that calls to mind more bride of Frankenstein than Dante’s Venus Verticordia.
What next one wonders? Da Vinci once said that ‘the artist must first learn diligence’ but in a society where the tools to remake oneself over are so readily available does such a sentiment still hold true? Where once the artist painted images directly from nature, now the trend has increasingly become that of creating from imagination, from subjective inner needs and inner impulses.
Perhaps in the not too distant future we will one day see the opening of a gallery where the walls are blank and the exhibit consists of surgically enhanced and reconfigured human works of art walking about. And maybe once and for all we will literally (i.e. physically rather than metaphysically) discover the ‘surgical’ answer to that age-old question of what really lies behind the Mona Lisa smile.
