Sampling and Art

foto Miguel Manso

The roots of sampling can be traced back a long way in cultural history. They reach from the Cento poems of antiquity to the quodlibet (Latin for "whatever pleases you") in the literature and music from the 16th centuries, from Arcimboldo's portraits and Bach's fugues to the myriomas in the everyday culture and games of the 19th century with the help of which landscape motifs could be permutated horizontally into combinatory panoramas. Although sampling is not a standard or obligatory term it should not be confused with the different forms the quote, the copy, the replica, appropriation, or collage can take. In contrast to the quotation it is not about a purposeful transfer of meaning and context. it is, much rather, a method of fragmentation, de-contextualization and transformation. A piece consisting of foreign quotes or found footage is not yet a product of sampling. Only when the single parts, in their combinatory logic, are transformed, made rhythmic, and structured in a way so that the individual samples do not function as quotes anymore but as generative basic material for a logic going beyound the parts, we can speak of sampling.

Thomas Feuerstein,
Sample Minds - Materials on Sampling Culture, Stefan Bidner, Thomas Feuerstein (Hg./Eds.)

Ana Mendieta's formative years at the University of Iowa were fundamental to her development as an artist. she transferred as an undergarduate in summer 1967, remaining a part of the University community for ten years and completing two master's degrees, the first in painting and the other five years later in the university's new Intermedia Program. During the 1970s she progressed with powerful spurts of creavity to create some of the most truly innovative earth-body performance pieces by any artist working in those individual genres from 1973 onwards. A study of her background, training, and artistic influences during this fruitful decade reveals the origins of her art.
(...)
A further set of performative self-portraits made during this same period, Untitled (Facial Hair Transplant), 1972, would form the basis of a set of silkscreens submitted for her master's thesis for the painting program. In two different pieces in the Intermedia studio, Mendieta slowly and deliberated transferred the facial hair of a friend, Morty Sklar, onto her own face in a seemingly ritualized manner. In the first piece, she is seated at a table before a mirror in the Intermedia classroom. She begins by applying glue to her upper lip while her friend simultaneously begins cutting hairs of his moustache, passing them to Mendieta to apply to her own upper lip. At the end of the piece the two are photographed together, showing his moustache and beard transferred onto her face.

Julia P. Herzberg

Ana Mendieta - Earth Body, Olga M. Viso, Hirshhorn Museum and Smithsonian Institution, Hatje Cantz Publishers, 2004

Rose Sélavy

In a statement that accompanied her thesis submission, she acknowledged Duchamp's famous Rose Sélavy and L.H.O.O.Q. as the sources of her work, and also cited her deliberate exploration of the ability of facial hair to convey power and suggest gender.

Julia P. Herzberg
Ana Mendieta - Earth Body, Olga M. Viso, Hirshhorn Museum and Smithsonian Institution, Hatje Cantz Publishers, 2004

PEÇA PÓS-OPERATÒRIA #1
Vou agradecer por ordem cronológica de contacto com este projecto:
Obrigada Miriam Sampaio, Kevin Murphy, Jurgen Bock, Luis Carmelo, José Alberto Ferreira, Miguel Manso, Sofia Ponte, Anibal Tavares e o público presente.

JUNHO DE VERÃO, COLHEITA SEM GRÃO

Ana Bezelga
“Adriana Coman, Anke Gießner, António Ribeiro, Barbara Ziesch, Bia Lima, Céres Vidal, Delfina Monteiro, Elena Iancu, Elke Dumboeck – Bayer, Emílio Almeida, Eugénia Turcan, Cristina Cunha, Guilherme Dutschke, Hans Heidler, Hilário Lima, Inge Dzur, Isabel Lopes, João Basílio, José Monteiro, Karin Aguiar, Kellen Búrigo, Klemens Detering, Lars Meschke, Maria Júlia Pereira, Merete Vargas, Milton Castro, Ronald Grätz, Sabine Grüninger, Sven Mensing, Ulrike Tsichlakis, Ursula Kuhlmann, Vasco Maia”

Vinil 3 cores (vermelho, azul, verde), Dimensões variáveis, Fonte Eurostile Plain, Tamanho 53.

Exposição da MAUMAUS - Escola de Artes Visuais no Goethe - Institut Portugal
Inauguração 14 de Julho de 2006 às 19h00
Até 28 de Julho, de segunda a sexta-feira, das 9h às 20h

Festival Escrita na Paisagem

Ana Bezelga recorda artista cubana
O festival "Escrita na Paisagem" prossegue no próximo dia 14 de Julho, pelas 21h30, no convento do Carmo, com uma performance de Ana Bezelga de homenagem à artista cubana Ana Mendieta.
Performance na qual a artista portuguesa reencena a performance "Facial Hair Transplant" de Ana Mendieta, realizada na Universidade de Iowa em 1972.
Mendieta que advogou a necessidade de, "para produzir imagens, regressar à natureza e ao contacto com a mãe-terra", associou frequentemente terra ao corpo feminino (num encadeamento de sentidos que pode integrar também exílio, identidade, nação, género). Para Ana Bezelga este restaging de Facial Hair Transplant é o primeiro momento de um projecto em suporte vídeo que pretende questionar a identidade e o género na arte contemporânea, projecto a que o Festival Escrita na Paisagem se associa.
Ana Bezelga é uma jovem artista na area do vídeo e da música, com um percurso de formação diversicado e para quem o vídeo ocupa um lugar central. Os seus trabalhos, centrados nas questões de género e identidade, têm sido exibidos em Portugal e no estrangeiro. O seu trabalho foi comissariado por, entre outros, Jurgen Bock, Paulo Mendes, Filipa Oliveira, Miguel Amado e Miriam Sampaio.

José Alberto Ferreira
in Diário do Sul, 13 de Julho de 2006