Martin Creed, The Lights Going On and Off, 2000. I’m not sure if this piece is necessarily a performance piece but it is in a sense a live piece in that it is created in the moments that the viewer engages with it. This work is in an empty room with white walls in a gallery in which the lights are on for 5 seconds and then off for five seconds. The timing of the on and off seconds is determined by the size of the room so that the viewer can walk through experiencing the light either turning off or on. What pulled me to writing about this work was a response on Martin Creed’s website by Maurizio Cattelan in 2004. From this simple piece Cattelan writes a very meaningful response of how a ‘simple truth’ of life is the roller coaster of ups and downs in a repetitious manner that never ends. He states ‘Are we afraid of the dark or just blinded by the light?’
This piece won the Turner prize. It would be one of those pieces 90% of my friends would say ‘oh this is art?’ and walk away. But it was able to evoke profound meaning in a significant amount of viewers, for each creating a meaningful experience, as they took the time to engage. This engagement is what ultimately completed the performance of Martin Creed’s work. There was a similar work he did, the video of it looking quite ominous where the lights in a large building go on and off in the same way. I never thought of performance art as being something so simple but if taken the time to think about – it really can have a profound effect. Both of these works are documented by video, played repetitiously on his website.
Sources:
(1) Coles, Alex. "Martin Creed." Frieze Magazine. 2005: Issue 89. Print.
(2)Fer, Briony. Martin Creed. Vancouver: Rennie Collection, 2011. Print.
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