Patricia
Mon, 09 Oct 2000 13:02:29 -0700
I've been reading a print-out an article I found on the 'net by Kathy O'Dell entitled "Fluxus Feminus" circa 1997, which is interesting reading and relates to Reed's posting on the women of fluxus/fluxus attitudes towards women, and the other postings on marriage performance. http://www.britannica.com/bcom/magazine/article/0,5744,245261,00.html It also contains info. about the fluxus marriage performance of George Maciunas in 1978 on the site of what now is the Emily Harvey Gallery. "Maciunas, long past the height of his excommunication practices and just a few months before his death, carried out a cross-dressing ritual at his own 1978 Flux wedding.[15] He exchanged with his soon-to-be-wife, Billie Hutching, his white tuxedo shirt and bow tie for her short, black, strapless slip and long-haired wig. One wonders, when imagining this scenario, if thoughts of the "Fluxus femme'-in-us" could have been an unconscious motivating factor, along with all the other more conscious factors Maciunas proclaimed (his aversion to artists not sticking to his preferred lineup of performances, as cited by Knowles, or his dislike for "overt sexuality" and "theatrical excess," cited by Schneemann) in at least some of his earlier excommunications? The ability of all the artists discussed to both write from their bodies and acknowledge that they have already been written, though once (perhaps) threatening, toward the end of Maciunas's life was (perhaps) a reminder that the "feminine" is not entirely about nature nor entirely about society and, therefore, not a threat to one's own biological or social status. That Maciunas titled his performance Black & White is telling. I would like to think that Maciunas discovered what some of the work he and others had dismissed had been demonstrating all along--that natural and social conceptions of the "feminine," and the connotations of power that attend, are not black-or-white, either/or issues. They can be constantly mixed--exchanged, as Maciunas so provocatively demonstrates by involving another person, a biological female, in this symbolic trade of gender-coded props. The "feminine," then, is shown to be both natural (the biological body does, after all, remain after all is said and done) and something wonderfully artificial, something that can be changed (at least in appearance, like any "text") at will. Akin to the very field of language in which Maciunas loved to play, the idea of "woman" was shown to be something that could be constructed and reconstructed, neologized, put on and taken off.[16] Maciunas's cross-dressing, then, his fake femininity through which the threat of woman was possibly dispelled, stands as an unconsciously motivated testimony to the successful contributions of the many women artists who have been, at one time or another, a part of Fluxus." I urge you to read the entire article - it's fairly lengthy, but worthwhile. Best, PK Don Boyd wrote: > George Maciunas had a Fluxus Marriage in I forget what year? > Who would know? Owen? -Don Boyd > _________________________________________________________________________ > Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com. > > Share information about yourself, create your own public profile at > http://profiles.msn.com.