News

Trace: documenting performance art

Renewed interest in performance art, its documentation and how it is collected has emerged with changes in media technology.

21 Jan 2014

Gina Fairley

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Visual Arts

Detail of Kerrie Poliness’s Field Drawing #1 documenting her white bio-paint performance at Werribee Park Mansion, 2008. Photograph Julie Nixon, courtesy the artist.

With its genesis in the late 1950s (not discounting historical precedents in Futurism and Dada), performance art as we understand it today emerged with a movement to democaratise and dematerialise the arts – simply, to take it off the walls and plinths and to challenge traditional representation.

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Gina Fairley

Gina Fairley is ArtsHub's National Visual Arts Editor. For a decade she worked as a freelance writer and curator across Southeast Asia and was previously the Regional Contributing Editor for Hong Kong based magazines Asian Art News and World Sculpture News. Prior to writing she worked as an arts manager in America and Australia for 14 years, including the regional gallery, biennale and commercial sectors. She is based in Mittagong, regional NSW. Twitter: @ginafairley Instagram: fairleygina