Amelia Jones. Performing the Wounded Body: A New Theory of Political Agency in the Visual Arts

In her lecture, art critic, historian, and curator Amelia Jones spoke about bodily wounding as art, and the components necessary for this type of work to be effective as a political agent rather than mere spectacle. Jones began by discussing the importance of contexts of wounding. On a basic level, there is the difference between wounding against one's will and wounding in which one knowingly engages, and this complicity is what makes wounding as art possible at all. Another important context is that which takes the wound beyond the physical act and into something representational of a larger form of suffering which then allows the wounding to act as a political statement. For example, in his performance "Close the Concentration Camps", Mike Parr sat with his mouth, eyes, ears, and nose sewn up, with the word "alien" branded into his thigh to protest the operation of Australia's detention centers. This performance piece links strongly to non-art centered means of garnering media attention like Abas Amini's sewing of his eyes and lips shut to demand rights for asylum seekers like himself.
Jones goes on to discuss the wound as representational and aestheticized. In order for wounding to be politically successful, it must ultimately generate a response of empathy in viewers, that although you can't feel how the artists pain feels, you feel you know how they feel. In order to do this, the wound must be real, or at least perceived as real, because it is the perception of it having occurred in an actual body and thus potentially in our own body that gives it significance. Ultimately, the political influence of wounding lies in the sublimation of reactions into action. This is the idea that the response to suffering, be it anger, emotional attachment, aesthetic response, eventually leads to sublimation, the Freudian concept of taking baser instincts and turning them into a higher form such as art or political action. At the same time, it is the aestheticizing of the wound which can be essential to prevent the wounding from becoming simply sensational, like pictures of prisoner torture in Iraq became. Aestheticizing helps the wound to be understood as metaphorical, in which sense we can look past the immediate urge to stop this particular person from hurting themselves to the greater implications. For example, Ron Athey's work often involves penetration of body orifices and other self wounding in reference to his own and others suffering of living with HIV, and his performances are often photographed by photographer Cathy Opie, in a highly aestheticized manner.
Despite Jones' assertions about the effect of empathy, sublimation, and representation in wounding, I am still left questioning the basic efficacy and legitimacy of wounding in art. The aspect I find most difficult to distinguish in my mind is the difference between types of wounding. The distinction between self-inflicted versus unwilling wounding is clear, however, outside of that, the lines between forms of self-inflicted wounding run together. From a psychological point of view, self-mutilation is an expression of psychological pain into physical pain, which seems mirrored by the intent of performance artists. Is it simply the different aesthetic qualities between these two practices that socially and politically legitimizes one, or the fact that one is performed in front of an audience while the other is deeply personal? I no doubt have an intense emotional reaction to acts of wounding, but I question the ways in which my reaction is mediated by any "sublimation" of empathy. I think the presence of such deep psychological pain and suffering is terribly sad and tragic, and in that way feel a sincere empathy with the artist or individual. My understanding even goes so far as understanding of the desire that goes along with translating psychological pain into something tangible, and the release this gives. That said, I guess the problem that remains for me in the transformation of this into art is that I think it cannot avoid becoming a spectacle, whether properly aestheticized or not, I think it becomes a spectacle in the same way mental illness becomes one. If this is true, wounding cannot ever really be fully successful in accomplishing any permanent political effect, and when unsuccessful in this, comes back to being merely a question of the welfare of the individual involved.