Just what is it that leads many contemporary artists to restage historic events great and small, performances of the past, and sometimes even imaginary events? Does this practice spring from a cynical awareness of the decline of values, the surrender to the logic of the society of spectacle? Is it yet another variation of Francis Fukuyama’s bitter prophecy of “the end of history”? Or is it simply the end of the modern myth of the “originality” of the work of art, a further confirmation of the fact that in conceptual art the process is more important than the end product, and an attempt to find a different, deeper path to critique the medial ideology of contemporary society?
RE:akt! Reconstruction, Re-enactment, Re-reporting sets out to offer some answers to these questions linked to the artistic practice of re-enactment and its possible redefinition. Through the texts of critics, theorists and artists such as Jennifer Allen, Antonio Caronia, Rod Dickinson, Domenico Quaranta and Jan Verwoert, and through works by Lucas Bambozzi, Vaginal Davis, Quentin Drouet, Janez Janša, J Eva and Franco Mattes (aka 0100101110101101.ORG) and SilentCell Network, the book seeks to explore the relationship between the historical, social and linguistic aspects of re-enactment, and the meaning of this practice, against the background of the history of performance and the increasing mediation of life.