This week’s video pick is Bruce Nauman’s Walking in an Exaggerated Manner around the Perimeter of a Square (1967-68). Paul Garcia of Not Coming to a Theater Near You has a piece about it. You should also check out their blog to see some of the other films and video art they have written about.
“Walking in an Exaggerated Manner Around the Perimeter of a Square represents a microcosm of the fundamental themes rooted in Bruce Nauman’s colorful aesthetic: circularity, repetition, minimalism, body awareness, and post-structural linguistic theory. These themes are ingrained into what is essentially a ten- minute performance of epic banality; : Nauman deliberately traipsing foot over foot along the perimeter of a makeshift masking tape square several times, alternating between forward and backward movements. It’s anti-film in a sense, the camera reductively operating only as a simple recording device, stripped of its power to manipulate the image and pared down to its base function as a dispassionate observer. All pertinent information is laid bare from the start; the title of the piece describes the entirety of the task that Nauman rigorously performs ad nauseam, simultaneously giving and taking instruction…”
Read the rest of Paul’s article here.
- The Woodmans - February 14, 2011
- Taiwanese CGI| California Pot Legalization - October 13, 2010
- Video | Surprise Attack - October 6, 2010
