Hitchhiking the internet with LaBeouf, Rönkkö & Turner
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Mid Atlantic Popular Culture Association Presentation November, 2018 Internet Panel
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Hitchhiking the internet with LaBeouf, Rönkkö & Turner
- 1. Hitchhiking the internet with LaBeouf, Rönkkö & Turner: #TAKEMEANYWHERE Katie Elson Anderson Rutgers University-Camden MAPACA, November 10, 2018 https://mapaca.net/conference/2018/p/hitchhiking-internet-labeouf-ronkko-turner
- 2. Abstract: In May 2016, the art collective LaBeouf, Rönkkö & Turner tweeted out coordinates via their twitter account (@thecampaignbook) and began the #TAKEMEANYWHERE project, which invited an audience to find the trio at those coordinates and, as the project says, take them anywhere. Over the next thirty days the trio traveled more than 10,000 miles with around 70 participants driving them around the country. This road trip through America explored community, connection, friendship, celebrity, trust, and intimacy, both online and offline. Using the internet and social media as tools to create and sustain the performance, #TAKEMEANYWHERE is a project that continues to thrive through enduring and growing connections. At the beginning of the project the trio created a Facebook messenger group and added the participants along the way. This group of diverse individuals from across the country continues to remain active more than two years after the initial project. This paper will focus on the #TAKEMEANYWHERE project while also providing a brief discussion of the trio's metamodern performance art, which explores empathy, emotion, humanity, social interaction, and community through digital and physical networks. Unlike performance art that takes place primarily in a physical location, the works of LaBeouf, Rönkkö & Turner are unique in their use of the internet to both establish connections during the performances and to sustain them afterwards. #TAKEMEANYWHERE explores the optimistic potential of using technology to create meaningful and enduring relationships through the shared experience of performance art.
- 3. LABEOUF, RÖNKKÖ & TURNER Shia LaBeouf ( Los Angeles) Nastja Säde Rönkkö (Helsinki) Luke Turner (London) http://labeoufronkkoturner.com facebook: facebook.com/LaBeoufRonkkoTurner/ instagram: instagram.com/thecampaignbook/ twitter: @thecampaignbook @Luke_Turner @NastjaRonkko
- 5. 2001- present structure of feeling oscillation irony/sincerity cynicism/optimism informed naivety response to postmodernism http://www.metamodernism.org/ Vermeulen, T., & Van Den Akker, R. (2010). Notes on metamodernism. Journal of Aesthetics & Culture, 2(1), 5677.
- 6. To provoke social change through art, as well as to disrupt the elitism of traditional forms of art, performance artists actively engage the audience. Performance artists challenge the traditional institution of art by involving art audiences in new ways. Since the early organization of the field, audience interaction has played a central role in the aesthetic innovation. Use of audience in performance art distinguishes it from other conceptual experiments in art. Wheeler, B. (2004). The social construction of an art field: How audience informed the institutionalization of performance art. The Journal of Arts Management, Law and Society Audience & Performance Art
- 7. Audience, Artists & Emotion “There is a false assumption in much art writing that we can be smart about emotions only if we are cynical about them” “If we struggle to find ways to adequately consider how emotion works in art, if it’s easier to dismiss the artist or the audiences emotionality as naive or as a critical failure, it is a partly because we have been working with inadequate models for what feelings are and how they work” Doyle, J. (2013). Hold it against me: difficulty and emotion in contemporary art . Durham; Duke University Press.
- 8. Audience & Celebrity Parasocial (Horton & Wohl, 1956) Social media= game changer Celebrity historically & cynically regarded as trivial, superficial, illusion of intimacy, inauthentic. “Capacities for direct interaction that social media generates between the fans and the celebrity is marked with enhanced levels of familiarity, disclosure, responsiveness and possibly even sincerity” Turner, G. (2013). Understanding Celebrity. London: SAGE Publications.
- 9. Text images from #TAKEMEANYWHERE: https://vimeo.com/257008225
- 10. Text images from #TAKEMEANYWHERE: https://vimeo.com/257008225 Images: LaBeouf , Rönkkö & Turner
- 11. “Generally speaking, then, in relation to presence, viewer activation, and duration, we have to allow that performance art does not only happen when and where it happens….it is a viable claim that the afterlife of performance is as important as the initial moment, insofar as that is when and where its meanings unfold, and that is where it generates transformations of the audience that are not strictly event-reliant” From: Ward, Frazer. No Innocent Bystanders : Performance Art and Audience, Dartmouth College Press, 2012.
- 12. "Their work offers provocations to the current art discourse through a thoughtful democratization process. By performing both at major institutions and small venues, and continually engaging with audiences on and offline, LaBeouf, Rönkkö & Turner reject hierarchies and embrace popular culture sincerely, without irony or cynicism, which is a rarity in artland." https://www.complex.com/pop-culture/2016/05/shia-labeouf-ronkko-turner-take-me-anywhere-road-trip
- 13. “#TAKEMEANYWHERE highlights humanity in a truly beautiful way. The message: Those who disagree with us are not monsters” https://www.gq.com/story/take-me-anywhere-luke-turner-interview Video: #TAKEMEANYWHERE: https://vimeo.com/257008225
- 15. Further Reading (not previously listed in presentation) LaBeouf, Rönkkö & Turner – #TAKEMEANYWHERE on POPBOLLOCKS #TribeLRT: Creative essay on LaBeouf, Rönkkö & Turner’s #TAKEMEANYWHERE by Andrew Corsa Numerous blog posts, YouTube videos, tweets and other social media posts available for first hand stories, pictures and experiences (working on compilation) Metamodernism: A Brief Introduction by Luke Turner Neutrality, narratives and neo-Nazis: Examining HEWILLNOTDIVIDE.US by LaBeouf, Rönkkö & Turner by Katie Elson Anderson Bibliography (in progress) available at: https://katieanderson.camden.rutgers.edu Previous presentations (MAPACA) 2017: Memes IRL: How the performance art of LaBeouf, Rönkkö & Turner unleasehd an internet subculture into the real world 2016: #CONNECTION: Audience participation in the performance art of LaBeouf, Rönkkö & Turner
Editor's Notes
- Abstract added to slide after talk for more context.
- Collaboration since 2014 participatory projects and performances that explore empathy, social interaction, humanity, connection, technology, digital and physical space and networks use of social media # to connect focusing on the creation of communities in and around the performances CONNECTION
- Some examples of the works- background of collaboration #IAMSORRY (response to plagiarism) Perfomance hashtags create community/participation /audience engagement use of social media both in around performances exploration of physical and digital space emotion, empathy utilize different ways to communicate- sometimes missing a form of communication (#andintheend no sound, #alonetogether- text – description of works)
- Metamodernist Manifesto yearning for utopia even when aware it can’t be achieved not a philosophy term is gaining popularity in literature, art, philosophy, political science different interpretaions/understanding- today’s talk focusing on Vermeulen & Van Den Akker and Turner my research- looking at how their works seek to understand, explore and display this structure of feeling need for sincerity and optimism to counter cynicism and irony not always positive
- Performance art (looking at how the trio’s performance art engages and requires audience ) anti-establishment seeks to dismantle the notion of art as separate from everyday life & located in an autonomous system of values and valuation engage an audience & allow people who have little or no formal acquaintance with or training in the art to participate as audience members. performance artists seek to make art relevant and meaningful to audiences not necessarily trained in the arts. audience necessary for the performance discussion in the literature of the role of the audience now becoming institutionalized seeing a more cynical view of performance art’s relationship to audience emerging LR&T continue to seek new ways to engage audience to avoid that institutionalization and cynicism one of those ways was through their #TAKEMEANYWHERE project- audience required (no one comes to pick up- no project)
- art criticism struggling to incorporate emotion critically demonstrates a need for authenticity and sincerity in the literature and criticism in order to discuss emotion need for more metamodernist lense criticism ignores audience experience and emotion Respond to the cynicism with sincerity- highlight emotion- invite emotion LR&T – example of harnessing, exploring and commenting on feelings
- celebrity studies: history of celebrity, different types of celebrity, audiences of celebrity celebrity element of the works often dismissed or alternatively over emphasized- must be considered but thoughtfully and sincerely parasocial: “one way of knowing another person who does not know the fan in return”, intimate but imagined closeness social media- shift to new paradigm for parasocial relationships- downsizes the gatekeeping process & creates more opportunity for engagement new implications for study of parasocial interaction, limitation on the description of parasocial not just the audience- social media allows a celebrity to gain power back lost to gossip industry; regain agency, authenticity, sincerity LR&T: seek to subvert the cynicism towards celebrity, gain agency, dismantle the notion of art & celebrity as separate from everyday life (performance art goal as well) opportunities to move beyond parasocial audience intent, motivation, expectations transcend parasocial?
- began tweeting coordinates (use of social media, comment on previous use in other projects) announced project at BMOCA (https://bmoca.org/exhibitions/2016/spring/takemeanywhere) “The American road trip has long been symbolic of a collective yearning to seek out beauty and truth within a corrupt nation” (theme of corruption) used Twitter to communicate location- social media as a primary mechanism of the performance reliance on audience for project to be successful (trust) presented the opportunity to move beyond the parasocial
- motivation for finding them- celebrity, participation in work, curiosity community formed both digitally and physically (note about previous works and social media community, people waiting in lines etc…) physical caravan trust in strangers trust in the networks shared experience definition of “success” of “failure”– meeting Shia?, adventure?, meeting others?, attempt? (further exploration) the stories not told or known those who tried, online experiences, etc….
- afterlife of the performance unique in performance art- going beyond the actual event- sincere, authentic connections messenger group- added people as they went along- creating community- continuing story, adding narrative TMA group’s ongoing growth and engagement- afterlife of initial moment- transformation of the audience no longer as separate from everyday life. (performance art and parasocial)
- Metamodern enduring connections afterlife taking on a life of its own Trust/Optimism/Sincerity/Authenticity rebels against the cynical concepts of celebrity seeking to do what performance arts seek to do- notion of art as separate from everyday life Challenging the paradigms of both celebrity and cynicism creeping into the institutionalized view of audience in performance art Ultimate collaboration audience-trust-authenticity-presence Beyond the performance-inispriation- Instagram painting, poetry around the word anywhere
- PLAY- Last few minutes of the film- group pictures
- WATCH THE MOVIE