Artist Is Present response

     It's going to be difficult to keep this response short because I'm so in awe of Marina Abromovic's work.

     One of the things I appreciate most about her is her bravery. I don't mean because she's exposed herself completely to an audience of people ranging from art connaiseurs to visitors with little to no background knowledge of art, let alone performance art, but because her performance pieces often run a risk of severe injury, require a high threshhold for pain, and sometimes leave her at the mercy of her audience. The one that impressed me the most wasn't discussed in the video, but I remember she performed one where she essentially gave strangers complete permission to do whatever they wanted to her by providing them with objects from flowers to knives to condoms. What I love about it is that, yes, it sounds insane to open yourself up to harm, but Marina is clearly someone with full control of her faculties and that performance showed what people are capable of when repercussions are removed from the equation. Every performance she creates has a purpose, and while some artists strive to do the same, I feel that sometimes they come across as pretentious and barely scratch the surface of what they're intending to say. I really get what Marina does. The ideas are immediate even if subtle because she's not injecting the piece with a meaning of her choosing; the piece contains all the meaning in and of itself. For example, the one where visitors have to pass through two nude bodies to see the rest of the museum challanges people to confront the paradigm that nudity is shameful; that bodies are to be hidden.It really brings you to question why things are the way they are. On the same note, her stamina is incredible. To sit completely immobile not only for one performance but every day for 92 days is amazing and speaks volumes to how passionate she is about her work. She really does captivate with her commitment to her work and her ability to connect with people because she pours every bit of herself into it. I could watch films on her for ages and write whole essays on her for days.