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"Etnografia: Modo De Empleo"; Museo De Bellas Artes. (Reviews: Caracas).


According to according to
prep.
1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians.

2. In keeping with: according to instructions.

3.
 the brochure for the exhibition, the intention of "Etnografia: Modo de Empleo--Arqueologia, Bellas Artes, Etnografia y Variedades" (Ethnography: a user's guide--archaeology, fine arts, ethnography and varieties) was to "examine the distinct ways in which art addresses its context, specifically through ethnography"--understood not so much as "representation" but rather as an "operation." Julieta Gonzalez, a young curator at the Museo de Bellas Artes, constructed a multi-layered exhibition from two conceptual references: Georges Bataille's magazine Documents (1929-30), reprint volumes of which were on display and whose subtitle was appropriated for the exhibition's own; and an epigraph ep·i·graph  
n.
1. An inscription, as on a statue or building.

2. A motto or quotation, as at the beginning of a literary composition, setting forth a theme.
 from Jacques Derrida's Archive Fever (1995): "Order is no longer secured." In her text, Gonzalez traces back the artistic appropriation of ethnographic strategies (field work, collection of "evidence," documentation, and their subsequent exhibition) to the Surrealists, with their interest in the tribal cultures of Af rica and Oceania, but it is only with institutional critique Institutional Critique is an art term that describes the systematic inquiry into the workings of art institutions, for instance galleries and museums, and is most associated with the work of artists such as Michael Asher, Marcel Broodthaers, Daniel Buren, and Hans Haacke.  and Conceptual art conceptual art

Any of various art forms in which the idea for a work of art is considered more important than the finished product. The theory was explored by Marcel Duchamp from c. 1910, but the term was coined in the late 1950s by Edward Kienholz.
 that these relationships were fully developed--in the diverse practices of Robert Smithson Robert Smithson (January 2, 1938–July 20, 1973) was an American artist famous for his land art.

Smithson was born in Passaic, New Jersey and studied painting and drawing in New York City at the Art Students League.
, Hans Haacke Hans Haacke (born 1936 in Cologne, Germany) is a conceptual artist.

Haacke studied at the Staatliche Werkakademie in Kassel, Germany, from 1956 to 1960. From 1961 to 1962 on a Fulbright grant at the Tyler School of Art at Temple University in Philadelphia.
, Dan Graham, Martha Rosler, Marcel Broodthaers, and so on.

A key issue underlying this process was a new perception of the "other" in contemporary ethnography, anthropology, and visual arts, now emancipated e·man·ci·pate  
tr.v. e·man·ci·pat·ed, e·man·ci·pat·ing, e·man·ci·pates
1. To free from bondage, oppression, or restraint; liberate.

2.
 from its colonized Colonized
This occurs when a microorganism is found on or in a person without causing a disease.

Mentioned in: Isolation
 condition. In this context, "Ethnography" juxtaposed jux·ta·pose  
tr.v. jux·ta·posed, jux·ta·pos·ing, jux·ta·pos·es
To place side by side, especially for comparison or contrast.
 the work of Haacke, Lothar Baumgarten, Mark Dion, Marcel Duchamp, and Joseph Kosuth, et al. with that of Latin Americans Juan Araujo, Colectivo Cambalache, Juan Downey, Daniel Guzman and Luis Felipe Ortega, Jac Leirner, Roberto Obregon, and Alfred Wenemoser, among others. At the center of the exhibition was the late Claudio Perna. Although still largely underrecognized elsewhere, he was one of the most important Venezuelan Conceptual artists. A geographer by training, Perna dealt with notions of the archive, the library, and the map. Here his work was presented mostly in the form of small notebooks, photographs, and collages from the '70s, together they suggest the atlas as an organizing principle.

"Ethnography" emerged as a complex undertaking, the result of a profound, exploratory approach to a set of difficult and timely issues. It might all have seemed impossibly convoluted, but Gonzalez devised an informative, no-frills presentation for the exhibition, including didactic materials presented on plain sheets of paper clipped to the wall, one for each of the artists in the show. There, one found not only captions but an extensive text on each artist, often accompanied by an epigraph from the likes of Foucault, Bataille, Debord, or Craig Owens. This was obviously a low-budget project (I was told it was put together for a few thousand dollars; a CD-ROM CD-ROM: see compact disc.
CD-ROM
 in full compact disc read-only memory

Type of computer storage medium that is read optically (e.g., by a laser).
 catalogue is planned but as yet unfunded); it is also an open, experimental one, meant to be followed up and further developed. These are tough times for Venezuela, and art institutions have experienced severe budget cuts across the board. Ironically, this is perhaps what made such an ambitiously original project possible.

But what does art have to do wit h ethnography (or anthropology or the documentary, for that matter)? So the formalist critic might wonder. In bringing such cross-disciplinary strategies to the field of contemporary art production and exhibition, at least one sticky notion is either questioned or strategically put aside: the notion of truth. The true question remains: Is the document fated to become an art object?
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Title Annotation:Ethnography: a user's guide--archaeology, fine arts, ethnography and varieties
Author:Pedrosa, Adriano
Publication:Artforum International
Geographic Code:3VENE
Date:Feb 1, 2003
Words:545
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