_1\1" g/I<-' 'l"V , 190 , .

De- collage/Coli age:

Notes Toward a Reexamination of the Origins of Video Art
.I () H N C /-I 11 ..'J H t\ R o T
to create new meanings by broaking up tha old .. .
Wolf Vostoll
I am ti red of renowing the ! onn of music , , , , I
must renew the ontological form of musi c.
Nom June Park
T he rhesrs o f thi s pa per is th at video, as a c ul tu ra l di scou rse, 11>15 been formed
by tWO Issues: (J ) it s oppos it ion to t he dum manr inst it ution of comme rcial
relevrsion; ( 2 ) th e inre rrexrual arc prac t ices of an int ernati onal co nst ella t ion of
art ists d utlng th e late 19 505 a nd early J 960s, T he mar er ial s and arg ument
pre se nted her e arc iru roducr or y and . J hope , serve to encourage research into
I he Iormal , aesr heric , and I dcol ogreal age ndas (hat we re Iare r to be embod ied
In Video 3 5 a contemporary inrern ar ional arc form.
T he ins t itutiona liz ation of che elecr roruc medium of relevis ion as a com
rnercial/srudro product ion led 10 urnform Styles and cod es for cult ural/ po l, t ica I
pr ogramming in the UIII ted Stares and Eu rope, By t he rnid - 19 50S. th e stat ts
t ics of how ma ny people owned relev rsions and t he a mount of cune t hey spent
in fronr of rhe rr sets were sta ggeri ng . One di d nor usuall y watch broadcast
television 10 see a new visual an form or an Inn ovati ve means of ex press ion .
Whe the r explicrrly in te r ms of adv ert is ing or irnpli cir ly in t he wa y of life por
trayed III popular melodramas or th e conrerit of new s programm ing . te levision
had become a marke t iug t ool. It was 0 0 1 the comrnu nica t ions medi um ir
claimed to be but , rather . a one-way c ha nnel , broadcasting prog rams th at
sa nctioned limi ted innova ti on and whos e ve ry mean s of p rod uc non we re mvi sr
blc to (he home cons u me r . Tel e vision , t hrou gh JlS manag eme nt by corporate
monop olies or Sta t e- run syste ms , had become a seamless hegemonic ins titu t ion .
T he inrrod uct Ion of the porrab le Videorape recor der and p layer m 196 ')
created t he poreru ial fur alrernati ve producti on by pl an ng t he cools of t he me
dium in the hands of th e Indi vidual an ise Ye t the body of post - 1965 Video
arr was profoundl y infl uenced by th e work of a few arrisrs who had a ppro
pr iarcd t he relevis ion as icon and ap par atus 10 t he year s p reccd ing J 96') , T hese
format ive co ncepts a re Impo rcanr In delineat ing the trajector y of t he his t ory of
video art as a d iscourse t hroug h th e 19605 co <he present . [ propose a reading
01 t ht: work of Nam j un e Paik J! rHJ Wolf Vosrel l that sug gest s rhat th ey pro
vidcd po we rful model s a nd ,l:cnealog ies for tilt' lat er p racti ces and rh ink ing of
video an ists .
In their examina t ion of tele vision , Paik and Vosrell confronted a powerful
state apparat us rh at , in both Europe and th e Uni ted St ates , loomed lar ge be
yond the high-art aura of mu seu ms and art ga llerie s. Television (and later
video) was nor coded by traditional arc-wo rld categ or ies and , like film before
it, offe red a new means for reproducing and cransforming the world around us
t hrough recorded images. Because tel evisi on was seen as a mas s medium, its
possibil ities as a flexi bl e electron ic and real - time medium were barel y explored
or recognized in rhe year s befor e art ist s g ain ed access CO a portable video tech
nology. The achievements of Paik and Voscell , both independenrly and collab
orat ively, wer e to st ri p tel evision of irs insricutional meanings and expose ir as
a powerful co-oprive force in capit alist soc iety. In rhei r writings and ac t ions,
Park and Vostell wer e attracted to both ideolog ica l and episcemological issues.
By fusing t he SOCI al and aest he t ic in single-channel and multimedia works
withi n insrall at ion, performance , and relev isIon format s, th ey rad ical]y q ues
rio ned the basi s of art as an elirisr and nonpublic discourse.
The incorporati on of t he te levision set into ar t works began am id a con
stellation of art and no nart events in a peri od when th e pr ocess of cr eation and
th e perception of art wer e chang ing . A number of movements, which were
identi fied by the labels Gutai , assemb lage, env ironme nt s, happenings, rnusique
concrere, let t risrne , nouveaux reaIisres, coneret e poetry, pop, fIuxus , minimal
ism, objecnve dance , and avanr-g ard e film , all shared an engagement WIth di
rect experience , the ph ysical pr esence of mater ials, and by excens ion , th e soci al
and cultural worlds t hese artists inhabited . By rejecci ng th e not ion of t he he
roic , existential arnsr- self, which had been associated with absr racr expression
ism , these movements reevaluated th e art obj ect and its sou rces . Ic wou ld be a
mistake, however, to define this period as a marginal phase or experiment in
some larger narrative of art history; rather, I wou ld argu e that this period was
not periphe ral but locat ed a major effort to demolish both the bo undaries be
tween art forms and pr actices in add it ion to th ose hi gher battlements that
sanctio ned off art from th e political and social.
The acknowledgment of th e everyday was articulated in various parodistic
and ironicall y cri ti cal agendas: the repl ication of popular cu lture and consumer
goods (pop ar t); t he performance of everyday gestures and movements (dance
and performance art); th e reducti on of method ro a fundamental materi al base
(early min imalism); a skept ical reversal of hi gh cult ural Standards and sanctions
(Fluxus) ; the revision of lang uage as a med ium of visual and linguistic expres
sion (Ietcrism) : the reworking of th e everyday visual enviro nment (nouveaux
reali st es); and the joining of different media and materi als in public actions
(happeni ngs) . These st rategies reoriented art is t ic practice away from p revious
hierarch ies and standardized cat egories to ward an ironic , detached, and explor
atory approach t hat acknowledged the quotidian ebb and flow of life. One of
t he inescapable faces of t his dai ly li fe was the omnipresence of tel evi sion .
... collage actions to cbange 1118 environment . ..
Wolf Vostell
A. eollage technic replaced oil-paint. the cathode
lay ."be will replace the Cli llVU.
Narn June Paik
II IS th e thesis of this paper t hat artis ts working with video in the early
Ii ) ( 'os wer e engaged in a utopian impulse to refashi on television into a dia
l" lI IH: of visual and audi t ory experiences th at would allow th em to reconsriture
rhemsclves as an eve r- renewing community of arrists.
The focus of my arre nt i on is on Fluxus and the nouveaux reali sr es, two
rlil.lps that incorporated th e "real" into their wor k, an aesrher rc t ech niq ue t ha t
,1l<.' flluxus artist Wolf Vostell called "de- collage. " J wi ll further suggest t ha t
toget her with the earlier strategies of collage (Kurt Schwirers) and
II'lldymades (Marcel Ducharnp) provide a basi s for under st anding th e strategies
" I video ar t. T he following , wh ich were selected to ident ify issues and are not
hnit ive (or eit her art rsr or period , are d rawn from Auxus and the nouveaux
II .dl,>tlS to suggest rhat there was a real dia logue and blurring of cat eg or ies lx.'
wren affil iarions of artists . 1 will further propose th at th e rechniques of collage
\111.1 de-co llage overlap media technologies and st rategies as they sha re in a turn
' " sOLial and political issues t hrough th e manipul ation of the mat er ial world.
Fluxus was a loose , anarchic assoc iati on of arti st s formed arou nd the me r
o uriu] of George Maciunas, its founder and lead ing adv ocate . Beginning
III rhc lat e 195 0S and extending through the 1960s and f970S, Fluxus as
Nl lf rw d a Stance t hat Can best be described as anti-high arc. Its act ions de
lumked the insrirut ions of t he art world with a playfulness and humor pre
v,,,"sly associated wit h dada and the seminal ideas of Ma rcel Duchamp. John
c who taught at the New School for Social Research in 19 54 . was a pri
nhl l'Y infl uence on Fluxus and a catalyst for the happenings th at wou ld occur
hllr r in th at decade. Cage's emphasis on the rol e of chance In art mak ing and
I'<'I-( l'p tion had a profound impact on a group of art ists including Allan Ka
I' IIIW, Wolf Vosre ll , Nam June Paik, George Brecht , George Maciunas, Dick
IlI l':}p ns , and J ackson MacLow. They postulated a conceptual basis for Flux us
111111 resulted ill event s whi ch highlighted the mat eri ali ty of consumer cu lt ure .
1\, with other anti-a rt movements during t his turbulent time , thi s gave a d is
I soci al edge to Fl uxus, whose efforts wer e directed to overturning the jar
/\1111 OIl art history and policies through subversive humor and irony.
The nouveaux real isres , an affiliarion th at was idenr ifled by t he Fre nch
'111 11 PII:rre Restany in 1960 and that was to break up by 1964, consisted of
I\UIIMI, I) ufrcn t.' , Raymond Hains , Yves Kl ein, Marti al Raysse, Dani le
" 1'(H' fn , J ean T inguely , Jacq ues de [a Vil legl e. The group, whic h, alrbough
h" 'ic'd III EUf()pe , was al wi t h such Am(' rit an artists as .I;1.' 11(.'t jnhns, !{ob
en Rauschenberg , John Chamberlain. and Richard Stankiewicz, reexamined
th e aesthet ic rre arrnenr of the obj ect by pursu ing th e approptiat ion of r he real
to new limits. It IS the corn post e rs of the "a fhc histes" (Hains , Villegle , Du
frene , and Mimmo Rotell a) that I am particularly interested in , especiall y in
relation to the de-collage of Wolf Vosrell and Fluxus . The spectator parti ci
pates in the process as he or she deci pher s and reexamines the consumer object
within the text of the work. The poster as a contai ner of commercial and polir
ical messages was a preelectroni c form of public ad vert ise ment. The visual a nd
linguistic economy of slogans and g ra phic announce ments IS rom apart by the
artist to reveal an arc heo log ical layer of hidden messages, deconstrucred to ex
pose their mat erial and ideolog ical base.
As the Happening is !fie fusion of various arts. so
cybernetics is the exploitation of boundary re
gions between and across v.rious ltxisting sci
enees.
Nam June Paik
mareel duchamps has declared rllBdymad e 0b
ieets as art, & the luturi sis deel ared noises as
an-it is an Important characteristic of my efforts
& !fIose of my colleagues to declare as art Ihe 10
tal event, comprising noise/obiecl/movemenl/
colorl& psych 0Iogy-a merging of eIements, so
thalli'e (man} can be art -
Wolf Vostell
Drawing upan the PIuxu s aest hct ic, Paik and VostcII removed relevision
from its convent ional setting by incorporating it i nto their performances and
installations. In so doing, they chalIenged what Ervrng Goffman has called th e
"org anizat ion of experience" by inventing th e " pr imary frameworks " of the so
cial order. I By viol ating rhe social and c ultu ral frames of reference we us e t o
organi ze our eve ryda y life, Paik and Vosrell " broke frame " (Goffman) . They
employed humor-defined her e as a su bve rs ive acr ron from inside the frame
that mocks Or undermines conventions of behavi or-co highlight the obvious .
As Umbeno Eco noted, humor " re m inds us of the presence of law char we no
longer have reason to obey. Jn so doi ng it underrn ines the law . It makes us
feel the uneasiness of living under the law-any The work of Paik and
Voscell attempted to undermine (h e "law " of tel evision by e mp loying coll age
and de-c ollage to make us uneasily aware of how televi sion functions as a me
dium shaping our world views.
Nam June Paik was born in Korea and ed ucated in J apan where he stud
ied Western rnodermsm in music . In th e 1950S he moved co West Germany
in order to pursue his interest in composition and performance. li n his perfor
manccs Pai k used his body as a metaphor for and III duo musi cal in
rumcnr . He created a number of " p repa red " pianos-s- inscrumenrs decorated
wit h noisemaker s , clocks, and assorted household ob jects . He would cho p,
wreck , or otherwise violate (he pi anos , often obta ining exrraord inary sounds.
Having a t tacked one of th e most cherished symbo ls of Western cul t u re
,Il"l bourgeois lite, the piano, Paik went afte r th e t elevi sion set, whi ch was fast
I.," om ing a new icon. H is approach to televi sion was tir sr delineated in his
ex hibi tron ar t he Galerie Parnass in Wuppert al . Wesr Germany, where
hr filled a room with televisions th at were ra ndom ly scarre red abou t on their
udcs, on their barks , or upside down . The appa rat us was scra tc he d a nd di s
It /ollm:d , and it s screen was either fill ed with abs t ract noi se or patterns gener
I,!t'd by magnet s applied to the se t , or was lefr blank ; thus stripped of TV's
11"11,] i t ional connorat ions and associarions , ir no lon ger fuIfi lled the f unct ion
l hrll tel evision usually serves in the home . By uuli zi ng the concept of " break
Ill) ; rhe frame, " Pai k su bve rted nor onl y what was see n on th e scree n, but als o
',.,lkngeu the way In which tel evi sion is under stood as an object of dally life .
In [ 964 Park moved to New York, and the following year he pr esented a
Pl l t' an ist exh ib it ion at (he N ew School , "Nam )une Paik: Electroni c TV,
( " lor TV Experiments , 3 Robots , 2 Zen Boxes a nd 1 Zen Ca n ." In t his instal
1,111011, televisi ons were remade so that new images co u ld be cr eated , often by
li lt: viewers th em selves . Among these pi eces we re Demagnetizer (or Life Ring)
( , . )6 ')) , a circular electromag net th at created wave pat terns on t he television
l lI ' t n ; and MaKnet TV ( 1965) , a t elevision set wit h a lar ge magnet placed on
1"1 ' tI'lat could be moved ro manipulate the a bs tract image on the scr een. In
." l d l l1.ll tl (0 th ese parr ir iparory pieces created wit h magnets , Paik in collabora
I'''H with jud Yalkur created pi eces suc h as Videotape Study No. .J (1967 -69),
\\ilH'rh distort ed the received image from broadcast tele vis ion . By manipulating
"" 1I 1l< lrrac k as well as image , Paik a nd Yalkur gave a wry and sacincal com
IH(' III,lry on t he pol it ics and content of broadcast tel evisi on. Paik employed the
,II l techniques of deconsrrucring images and tec h niq ues through cha nce
1'11I( 'lllI::S 10 order to expose their hypocrisy . These works became a model for
I vn-wc r-cont rollcd televi sion, a co ncept Park has pursued t hroug hout his ra-
Itl O'
11'ik was always at the for efront in appropri ar ing new video technology,
'" h ils the Sony Porrapak in 196'), ,1S well as in de vel oping new tools for im
"I\" mak ing as he did in creating the Paik-Abe video sy nt hes izer wi rh the japa
11" '1' "ll f.:inecr Shuya Abc . In Global G roooe ([ 9 73), produced t hroug h the Tele
l.uhorar nry at WNET In New York , Paik introduced a global model of
tclevrsion, proclaiming a future "TV GUide as thick as t he Manhattan
II 1"1'1111Ill' d irector y." In this work. Paik devel oped a collage technique by sy n
""" 11/111,1\ ima,l-;g:; fron .1 a v,lri et y of sources (Japal wst: television. avanr -gardc
hllllllla k(rs such Robert lind Jonas Mekss , a nd other art ists Crom John
t .1111' 10 Kurc.m fnlk d:ItJC<..:rs). Paik's video collaJ'l' t ech ni que been 1-' xtCI-idlOdi
J une Paik and J ud Yalkut , VidiOJape SINdy No. J. 19
6
7-
6
9.
to hi s g loba l sate llite proj ects such as GoM Morning Mr, Uruel! (J 986) , wh ich
invit ed the parri cipar ioo of per formers and ar tis ts around the worl d co be part
of his "Global Groove" ex travaganza , an incernacional mi x of synthesized im
ages that combi ned and recorn bi ned wit h eac h ot he r in both real -rime and
posrproduced modes ,
By th e mid-J 950S, the German- bo rn art ist Wol f Vosrell had begun to
prod uce a remarkable series of multimedi a proj ects, pe rfo rma nces, and act ions .
His artist's publ icarion , De-(ofllage , CO which Paik contributed , documented
Vostell ' s con cept of de-coll age , a ki nd of happen ing event thar oft en took p lace
on a large scale and involved an engagement with the publi c space as a soc ial
envi ronme nt. In t he De-colllage p ublication , all manners of te xt and info rma
tion were erased in a rechruque t ha t reveal ed d ifferent ele me nts by tearing off
rhe sur face to reveal new combinat ion s. This was opposed to t he coll age tech
nique of adding on and Joining d iff eren t mat eri als i n new combinat ions , [n hi s
d(:-I..'olla gc proj ects that incor pora t ed te levisio n, Vosr el ] artil;lIlat cd a powe rful
(dt iqu(; nf rhe medium as ideol og y. to 1I0dl:Trnilll.' t1w pn lirl ('ill
assu mptions of soc ial discourse and t he commodity definiuons of hi gh-art
cu lt u re .
Vostcll's performan ces explored rh e bo undaries between th e prima ry
frames of organ ized experience ; in his video works , th e soc ial and cult ural
meani ng of tel evisi on was t ransfor med and , In rhe p rocess. so was our rel at ion
to ir , ! n lu s T V De-milage ( {96 1), a wall d isp lay in a Par isran depa rt me nt
store, Vosrell proposed dist or ting th e received broadc ast Image in order to sub
vert t he o rd inar y frame of refer en ce, a de -co llage techni q ue t har rei ied o n ran
dorn Inter ference with rhe broadcast to cause a consranrl y cha ngi ng eras ure of
( he Image . The ir onr c intention of Vosrell's i nst all a rron was to comme nt on
prog rammi ng wr t hm th e ver y ma rket place (h ac re lev rsron se rves- t he depart
II ) Co t sro re .
Two ot her proj ect s wer e pr esen ted at the 196 " Yam Fesrival organ ized by
Robert Wa tts, George Brecht , and All an Kaprow at G eorge Segal 's far m in
New Jersey and concu rrently in an inst allat ion at th e Smo lin Galle ry In New
Yor k Clry , A performance of T V De-mIlage in New Jersey began inside a she d
where a relevrsion was cove red WI rh objects, such as ba rbed wire and a pi cture
lrarn e , which dc-coll agcd rh e se t by refranu ng il and remov ing it from Irs cus
w mary conrcxr. In a mock ce remon ial i nterment , Vosretl , wit h Dick Higgins ,
lIyo, AI Hansen , and Other s , ea rned t hc telev isron rnro a helJ where a ho le
was Jug i n the ground with shov el and jackhammer. The broadcast image was
i hcn alte red and tran sformed , t he set was removed and d estroyed. and finall y
{he relevrsion set itself was bu rred . In t hrs pubhc act ion of de-col lage , Vosrcll
commented on th e publi c mst rrut ion l.l f relevision as somet hing to be con
lrunr ed and transfor med through arc. The text prepared by Vosre ll for th e
('vent IS a description of de- collage TV.
TV-pi cture De-fonnalion
with
1fI1111netic zones
00 IT YOURSELF
Wolf Voslell
How to de-educate the educational TV???
Nam June Paik
'TV T rouble ( 196)) CI t rhe Smoli n Ga llery consrsred of a roo m filled wit h
Irl cvision s resnng on top of th e fur niture and file cabinets. Or laid on th eir
',j , lc- : T Vs whose recepr Ion had been d ist ort ed or reduced to s imp le wave
I' ,IIIl:ls . As a commentary on borh office space as infor mation Storage and on
[,'!t'vi"on as a form of informa ti on, (he pi ece was a de- collage of the .I S
well as of tele vision Itsel f. By deconsrruc ung rhe ideo logy of televi sion , Vos n-ll
d lcll ivcly "broke th e (rarne." t ",kin g fi r! (')1.11 or the arc world in order l(J help
11 '1 understand rhc real fW) 1;1 1Un li f wll h i", soci ety
lI05leli. De--cof/.agf Per/onIJdJl cc. 196, . Peter Moore
The srrarcg ies employed by N am June Paik and Wolf Vosrell are closely
aligned co those of Fluxus and t he nouveaux realisres. Park is identifi ed wirh
Vosrell In that they sh ared collaborati ons and interests as membe rs of t he In
ternational Fluxus mo ve ment. However , my po int is not to delineate their dif
ferences or sirnilariues or to ascertain who did what first, for Paik and Vosrel l
are nor al one in th e early hi story of video as an arc form. Nor should we set
infl uences on the earl y hi story of video an on ly In terms of those ar tists who
directl y employed the medium. The roles that these movements played were
important both an hist orically and cult ura lly as examples of the reciprocal rel a
ti onship that exists between evolvrng modes of de p ict ion a nd perceiving .
These earl y pieces demonstrat ed the need for artists to question televi
si on's economic and Ideological power (as exemplified in Vosrell's work) and to
create new tool s and experi ences our of video and tel evision (as embodied in
t he extraordinary career of Paik), By q uestioning the nort on of a high arc re
moved from everyday experience. Fluxus and other, const ella tions of ar ti sts at
tempted a d ialogue between artist , artwork , and public. Th e de-collat,\ed post
e rs of Vj lJeftl &, whi{;,h were u pped a nd torn apar r ro reveal a lte red alignment s,
W<;ft rn9rG (h:.\lll J 'lclr m,,1 exerc i se: like Vosr c ll 's proposed dC-{illIl\,4<: d wu] ] of
tc lcvrsinns in rhe departmen t Scor e, th e public wall of the posters combined
sriltc menrs of defacemem and revelation . fly ulerting us t o how we l ooked at
television, Paik a nd Vosrell proclaimed th e possibility of ch anging this tela
rionshlp from a passr ve to an acr ive one.
The hi story of VI deo as ;.n aesthe t IC d is<__ourse is one of a language of co l
lage, In wh ich strategies of Image processing and recombinatiOn evoke a new
v rsuaI Iaug uage from the mu It next ual resou rces of Inrernar ronal cul tu re . Th e
speCtacu lar hi story of the ex panded forms of video inst allation Can be seen as
an ex rerisron of th e techni ques of collage m ro the temporal and spatial di rncn
"i"ns provrdcd by Video rnonuors placed in an inre rre xt ua l dialogue with Othe r
m.uerial s Thus th e works of Mary LUCIer, Rita Myers, Fabrizio Plessi , Buky
S l hwa rrz , and Ot he rs con r rnue a nd buil d Oil this process . The technique of de
t ollage In vid eo Install ati on al so extends performance and mulrimed ia m ro a
( r it ique of (he socral and ideologi cal by de construn ing existing co ns tr uct ions
or rechnol ogr es and mdusrri es. Here one is reminded of the
work of Franc ese TOITes, Juan Downey, Pap er T iger Tel evi si on , a nd Di eter
flr'K'se.
The d irecr ions and opposi I ion s arc icu Iaced rn t he earl y approprrar ion of
ulcvisio n by afCIs ts an d rhe: r conr rrburio n to image making comi nues today III
Iht' international a nd mrerc ul ru ra l alIg nment of arrisrs who are rega ining a
ummunity of sh ared intention as t hey conti nue to exp lore rhe possib ili t i(.s of
art of (h e future.