Understanding Installation Art - Mark Rosenthal

In this exert from his book, Rosenthal goes someway to explaining what constitutes this genre of art and where its' origins began.

As early as the 15th century evidence can be seen in Fra Angelico's paintings in the monk's cells at San Marco of an environment being intrinsic to decisions made when undertaking the paintings. In the Lascaux Caves in France, paintings thought to be more than 17,300 years old, embrace the rhythmic uneven surface of the caves to portray features of animals thought to have lived there.

Fra Angelico, Mocking Of Christ, Convento de San Marco, Florence, Italy (1440 - 1441)

Michelangelo adopted this method of 'site specific' art when painting the Sistine Chapel and Laurentian Library. Rosenthal suggests the connection between early art and its enveloping space has often been ignored. That these examples that have paved the way for modern and contemporary artists who make the surrounding space integral to their art. Thus broadening our horizons as to what constitutes art.

Michelangelo, The Sistine Chapel ceiling, Vatican City, Rome (1508 - 1512)

The many facets of installation art have made it difficult to define and to understand. For this reason it has struggled in gaining recognition. Rosenthal makes the point that its necessary interaction and subsequent intimate relationship with the viewer breaks through traditional (and literal) boundaries that typically separated the two.

 In comparison to art (in the traditional sense) and sculpture, installation does not sit on a throne to be revered by its audience. It does not require merit for its artistic value as an object but instead for its ability to engage the senses in an altogether deeper experience.  Accomplished in a multitude of scenarios, installation art can more easily be defined by a space with usually more than one object, or no objects at all but ultimately where the overall space is central to the art or greater than its components.   

                                                                                                                                              

Many artists have long since positioned themselves on the cusp of art in its historical context. Citing a need for something that incorporates 'the experience of life'. Robert Rauschenburg once said he operated, ''in the gap between art and life''. Installation is suggested therefore as an investigation of life and is such about a temporary time and space. It is the artists intention that installation and viewer both in their state of transience, come together in the present moment and experience an intertwining.

While Installation art is diverse Rosenthal proposes a grouping can be made under two headings - ''filled-space installation'' and ''site-specific installation''. The first is defined by the possibility of recreating it with ease at another site due to the fundamental relationship being with its other parts rather than the space it inhabits. The latter bears a correlation both to its parts and to its location. Moving it would disrupt its whole meaning.