Active Audiences: On the Representation and Theory of Spectatorship, Activism, and Public Culture

31.03.2012 /5:00 p.m.
Screening Room. Yerba Buena Art Center (YBCA)
Panel Discussion (Skype)
Organized by Betti-Sue Hertz

Active Audiences: On the Representation and Theory of Spectatorship, Activism, and Public Culture

An engaging panel discussion featuring four speakers representing different perspectives on current artistic trends around audiences, spectators, and fans. Academics Henry Jenkins (University of Southern California) and Andrew Weiner (California College of the Arts), with artists Andrea Bowers and Tania Bruguera (via skype), examine issues of spectatorship in contemporary practice in an attempt to understand the individual’s behavior within environments of collective participation.

From an artistic, art historical, and scholarly approach to the performative, mass media, and the internet, the speakers will expand on the politics of artistic interpretation and how those relate to an individual’s social, cultural, and political identity. What is the difference between social citizen and participant viewer when redefining notions of the public beyond spectators, fans, and activists?