| Bruce Nauman's studio performances of the late 1960s, recorded in film and video, are often interpreted in terms of the body as a sculptural material. The predominant reading of Nauman's art as "bodyworks" does not distinguish his studio performances on film from those recorded on videotape. Video's unique characteristic of simultaneity extends the meaning of these works into the psychological and beyond the purely phenomenological. Further, Nauman's shift from film to video altered his working methods, the viewing conditions of his work, and, most importantly, resulted in a change of content. I argue that in Nauman's videos the issue of surveillance, rather than the phenomenological experience of the body, figures more prominently. Ignoring the differences between the two mediums overlooks the psychological implications of his videos. One distinguishing quality of video is its instant feedback, in which an image can simultaneously be recorded on videotape and transmitted onto a television monitor. As a result, Nauman could tape his studio performance while watching himself in the monitor. Nauman later exploited video's capability of surveillance beyond monitoring his body to that of the viewer's in the watershed work Live-Taped Video Corridor (1970). Nauman's work had new significance as he shifted from working in film to video, upholding media theorist Marshall McLuhan's declaration that "the medium is the message."... |
