A Journey through installation Art
Prabuddha Ghosh
Installation art is one of the most important and provocative developments in the visual arts during the last half century and has become a key focus of artists and of contemporary museums. It is also seen as particularly challenging or even disliked by many viewers, and—due to its unique in situ, immersive setting—is equally regarded as difficult or even beyond the grasp of present methods in empirical aesthetic psychology.
An art installation is a three-dimensional visual artwork,
often created for a specific place or location and designed to change the
perception of space. The term “installation”, which appeared in the 1970’s,
generally applies to works created for interior spaces (ie. gallery, museum);
outdoor works are more often referred to as public art, land art, or, to put it
roughly or widely, humans intervening on an environment and putting their
“stamp” on it.
That said, an outdoor piece can most certainly be considered
an “installation” of sorts, but, typically, installation art is most often found
within an indoor space, as some artists would prefer to contain their creative
statement to the context of a room, which is simple enough for a viewer to
comprehend.
The installation, once constructed, is most often expressed
in such a three-dimensional setting as has been mentioned: within a room, where
the artist includes the environment as part of the work, or other factors,
which distinguishes their work from simply hanging a 2-D piece.
The 3-D work is put into a situation and makes use of the
off-field, a dimension that is not immediately visible to the person who is
watching: the mere fact of including it as a “spectator” calls for notions of
participation, immersion, and theatricality.
The space of the installation can be closed (eg limited to a
waiting room, a kitchen, etc.) or open (for example a bridge, a wheat field, a
square, a street, a city etc.): thus, Land art tends today to be redefined by
the yardstick of the concept of installation.
Finally, an installation can be either: mobile (or re-mountable);
permanent (or fixed); ephemeral (or temporary). The installation can most often
be assimilated to a sculpture but it can not be reduced to it. One speaks of
hybridization and mutations.
It also makes it possible to explode the notion of volume:
the installation can be understood as an object of reduced size to a very large
space...
Specificity: Some installations are designed for (and
depending on) a particular exhibition location.
Interaction: in some cases, the public is led to interact
with the installation or even the artist himself.
The distance between the public and the work is more or less
abolished; in some cases there is participation, the public penetrates within
the perimeter proper to the work, engendering new types of relations between
creation, creator, and viewer.
This brings us to the point about art, and what is exactly
the point of it all? Is it to create
enjoyment for the viewer / person experiencing the art, or is it simply to
provoke thought?
As you probably know, if you like art, you must also be
aware that there are those of us who just don’t really enjoy art, and, in
particular, art that isn’t extremely easy to understand the meaning of at a
glance.
Art which challenges the viewer, which installation art can
often be, can often elicit feelings of strong dislike or confusion from the
person witnessing it.
Such artworks might lead to multiple ways of engaging and
participant responses, much as with other art media. However, certain factors are
potentially most prominent and thus key candidates to empirically consider:
First, installations tend to cause and/or emphasize the foregrounding of some
aspect of the viewer’s effective responses, especially felt emotion. This has
to do with the designed enveloping nature of the medium, which coincides with
an expectation for the presence of a perceiver who, by engaging within the
space and interacting with all senses, in a way completes the artwork. Viewers
may have a basic awareness and appreciation or remembrance of certain
sensations—such as the warmth and intensity or even melancholy of squinting and
staring into a sun or walking in an icy barren land.
By creating an encompassing space often with a moving
viewer, installation artworks may also act to “walk an individual through” an
evolving encounter, and individuals might experience several emotions or
evaluations within one experience. For example, a space may be designed to
slowly reveal new features. Artworks may also require some acclimation or
dawning awareness of different senses. Artists may also anticipate
juxtapositions which could lead to mixed (positive and negative) or changed
response. One might feel an initial discomfort or oppression.
All of these aspects—diverse emotions, awareness and
reflection, meaning making, as well as a tendency to juxtapose
environment/expectations and even insight—mark compelling research questions.
They also mark the present limitations in empirical approaches.
The need for more on site, in depth studies has only grown
with the increasing awareness of the importance of context in aesthetic
judgments. Researchers are becoming concerned with the need to consider art
reception as a complex interplay of the expectations of the viewer, the
characteristics of the art object, and the conditions in which it is
experienced. Installation art also adds the unique aspect of the mobile viewer
and the inclusive environment, with an individual who may potentially engage
with any aspect of the spaces as part of their encounter.
These all are nearly technical discussion about the art
genre or this kind of art, but it has very old connections with Indian rituals,
whether the basic pattern of tantra, puja, asanas, Mandala, chakra and sadhana.
It can be told that all these, which were on this earth through Indianian
pattern for last few centuries or even thousands of years.
In very early days during 1915 - 20, then 1925-35 there were
certain pieces of art displayed in various part of western world, sometimes
they have been marked as the most hated works of art and didn't have the label
of "Installation Art". But from the nature of display and pattern of
work could be spot them as initial pieces of "Installation Art". Later,
during 1968, or onward it got the new name and few artists started to work
with this genre. Due to participation of huge numbers of artist and non-artist
contributors, it started to receive some popularity and this time could be
called as the beginning of "Installation Art". In India also it has
left some mark from 1970 onward.
The study on this also has other caveats and questions for
future research. Future analyses should include more samples of different
types, a wider range of art, and more focused hypotheses. Note also that it has
been included a handful items and samples during writing this article. There
are a wealth of other factors—more specific movement, body responses, other
senses, that might and should be considered. This includes the ability to
meaningfully assess people’s experiences of installation art and to uncover
art/person differences. It is clear that many viewers can and do have
meaningful reactions to installation art, driven largely by their generally
positive or negative emotions, rather than where they look or their
interpretations of meaning. We also thus support the sensitivity or efficacy of
the included measures, laying out a paradigm that might be employed in future
research. I also feel that researchers should further examine the experience of
installation artworks as they provide optimal contexts for more ecologically
valid investigations of the experience of art.
1. Work of Vivan Sundaram; 2. Work of Anish Kapoor; 3. Work
of Subodh Gupta; 4. Work of Thomas Dumbo; 5.Work of Nikhil Chopra.
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