A TRANSCENDENTAL MOMENT: PHENOMENOLOGICAL QUALITIES OF THE TIME PIECES OF MAX NEUHAUS
Clint E. Rule ARTH 701-01: Contemporary Art May 17, 2010
A TRANSCENDENTAL MOMENT: PHENOMENOLOGICAL QUALITIES OF MAX NEUHAUS’S TIME PIECES Introduction
In 2009, the magazine Art in America published the following letter to the editor: “I work at 45th Street and Sixth Avenue in New York City. One evening some years ago, I walked across a traffic island at 4th and Seventh Avenue, and heard a strange sound coming from the sidewalk grating. It was metallic, deep and harmonic, with what you might call an urban New York mechanical strength. The sound had no discernable notes, so it wasn‟t really musical, but it wasn‟t noise either. It seemed to ebb and flow like a musical composition. I asked a police officer about the source of the haunting sound; he didn‟t know. Along with many other people, I often returned to that area of Times Square specifically to listen. At one point it occurred to me that this was a work of sound art. I wrote to the Museum of Modern Art to inquire, but got no answer. Recently, I picked up a copy of Art in America and read the obituary of artist Max Neuhaus. To my surprise, I found out that he had created the sound work in 1977…Like thousands of others, I am grateful to the artist for giving me the experience of his work.”1 Much commentary surrounding Max Neuhaus addresses his relationship with visual artists, his concern with space, and the difficulty of classifying what type of art he creates. However, what is perhaps lost is the capacity of a Neuhaus work to reach through a public space and subtly affect a passerby‟s perspective—as is attested to in the above letter. This paper intends to explore the connection between Neuhaus‟s pieces and how they serve both as representatives of phenomenology and triggers into phenomenological transcendence. In making these connections, the human experience of the works can be better understood. According to his sister, Neuhaus was a natural born drummer, banging pots at an early age. His mother was a pianist, and his father was a chemical engineer. A perhaps fitting 1
Steven Ross, "Aural Remembrance," Art in America, December 2009: 24.
combination that could be seen influencing the musical and technological rigor found in Neuhaus‟s approach to art later in his life. He received a bachelor‟s and a master‟s degree from the Manhattan School of Music.2 Neuhaus was a successful percussionist in his twenties: “As a soloist, Mr. Neuhaus performed concerts in prominent halls. „Neuhaus Rubs, Tickles and Pats Variety of Instruments,‟ said a headline in The New York Times with a review of a 1964 performance in Carnegie Recital Hall. And his recordings were testaments to a virtuosity that was matched by few other percussionists.”3 Some of these recordings are said to have some of the finest interpretations by such modern composers as John Cage.4 At the age of 28, Neuhaus decided he was finished with the traditional creation and reception of music. He stopped performing. Instead, he began to develop a relationship of working with sound that was more direct and more concerned with placing sound in a space, rather than an event. “Neuhaus‟s work stems from the assumption that our perception of a place depends as much on what we hear as on what we see, even if the aural sphere is much less conspicuous.”5 More often than not, Neuhaus and commentary surrounding him claim that his move into the art world was a move away from the world and title of musician. Despite being influenced by Cage, Neuhaus move was toward the public space and the concept of sound as a means of exploring space; whereas, Cage was still largely concerned with the concert hall. For the most part, Neuhaus part denied the title of musician and did not classify his work as music.
2
Bruce Weber, "Max Neuhaus, Who Made Aural Artwork, Dies at 69," The New York Times, February 9, 2009. 3 Ibid. 4 Daniela Cascella, "Max Neuhaus," Contemporary 75 (2005): 38-39. 5 Ibid.
This was probably a matter of framing how people approached his work rather than an academic classification. As far as titles go, Neuhaus seemed to altogether dislike them. He was rather skeptical of the term „sound art‟ despite supposedly being the person that coined the phrase „sound installation‟.6 Many commentators arrive at the title of “sculptor” for Neuhaus. This term is not without historical import. The 1960‟s saw a generation of artists moving from the object to the physical space occupied by the object. Visual artists executing this shift often relied on sculpture to alter and interact with space. Sculptural pieces—such as the notorious Tilted Arc by Richard Serra—established the site specificity integral to the movement. Max Neuhaus‟s work—with the exception of its non-visual quality—is most easily classified in this movement, and this is perhaps why he is often classified as a sculptor. Neuhaus eventually began classifying his pieces as belonging to either of two categories: „moment works‟ or „place works‟. “The moment pieces don‟t construct places, but they cause this realization of place to happen when they disappear; in the same way that the place pieces do not construct time, but they allow your own realization of time to happen within their static nature. Each one generates in the perceiver the opposite of what it is: the moment pieces generate an instant of being in one‟s own place; place pieces generate a period of being in one‟s own time. They are two opposites; each one is what the other is not.”7 The Times Square piece mentioned in the letter to the editor at the beginning of this paper is a „place piece‟, because the sound used in the piece is a constant drone. The place has been determined by the artist—hence the categorization—but there is no predetermined time, because
6
Daniela Cascella, "Max Neuhaus," Contemporary 75 (2005): 38-39. Max Neuhaus, Max Neuhaus: Sound Works, Vol. I, II vols. (Ostfildern: Cantz Verlag, 1994), 101. 7
the drone does not waiver or end. However, pertinent to this paper are Neuhaus‟s series of Time Pieces, which are his most noteworthy moment works. The first time piece was installed in the Austrian city of Graz, a fitting site with a rich history of sound as a signifier of community events—when to attend church, when the school day was over, when to seek refuge, and so on. “Within this spirit, Neuhaus‟ Time Piece Graz creates a space outdoors around the Kunsthaus that is defined with sound. It occurs periodically as a sound signal. Unlike the traditional sound signal of a bell, though, whose sound commences at its peak and then slowly dies out, at the Kunsthaus Neuhaus has created a sound that enters the consciousness of passers-by when it disappears. Beginning inaudibly ten minutes before each hour, the sound gradually grows. Five minutes before the hour, at its peak, it suddenly stops, creating a moment of stillness. Thus, this building, which as a house of art is focused upon human perception, at regular intervals emits a signal that momentarily reminds people of its presence. Max Neuhaus has given the Kunsthaus Graz its voice.”8 This quote is helpful in understanding how the piece operates. However, it could be misleading. The sound emitted by the piece—while it was sculpted specifically for the place—is not the voice of the museum. Rather, the sound of the time piece gives way to the aleatoric, natural sounds that already exist in the space. The immediate cessation of sound from the piece calls a subject‟s attention out of herself—out of what may well be an internal focus—to an external perspective, to the sound of the space and, consequently, the space itself. It is this concern with perspective that makes many connections with the philosophy of phenomenology. Phenomenology is a philosophical movement born in the early part of the twentieth century, created by German philosopher Edmund Husserl. It has been critiqued and adopted in whole or in parts by thinkers such as Jean-Paul Sartre. It still persists today as being one of the
8
Time Piece Graz - Kunsthaus Graz, 2010, http://www.museumjoanneum.at/en/kunsthaus/time_piece_graz (accessed May 15, 2010).
more substantial movements of the twentieth century; however, it remains—as it began—an underdog of sorts and challenger to the more prevalent systems of modern thought. “In the Cartesian, Hobbesian, and Lockean traditions…, we are told that when we are conscious, we are primarily aware of ourselves or our own ideas. Consciousness is taken to be like a bubble or an enclosed cabinet; the mind comes in a box. Impressions and concepts occur in this enclosed space, in this circle of ideas and experiences, and our awareness is directed toward them, not directly toward the things „outside‟…[W]e are caught in what has been called an „egocentric predicament‟; all we can really be sure of at the start is our own conscious existence and the states of that consciousness.”9 Phenomenology challenges this „egocentric predicament‟. Instead, phenomenology asserts all consciousness is consciousness of something. That is, “all our awareness is directed toward objects.”10 Thus, objective reality is knowable in a direct way. This is, of course, an over-simplified description. This paper is not intended to unpack the entirety of the movement. However, accessible, basic components of the philosophy will be seen through Neuhaus‟ time pieces. Intentionality is perhaps the most fundamental concept in phenomenology. The word refers to how a person engages with and is engaged by the world and objects therein. Sokolowski puts a finer tip on it: “The core doctrine in phenomenology is the teaching that every act of consciousness we perform, every experience that we have, is intentional: it is essentially „consciousness of‟ or an „experience of‟ something or other. All our awareness is directed toward objects… Every act of consciousness, every experience, is correlated with an object. Every intending has its intended object.”11
9
Robert Sokolowski, Introduction to Phenomenology (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 9. 10 Ibid., 8. 11 Ibid.
Intentionality is the most basic connection a person has with the works of Neuhaus. If intentionality is a combined “effort” on behalf of both an object as well as the beholder, sound personifies the furthest reach an object can have. Whereas, most visual arts reach out only when they are in a viewing range, sound enters the ear and is processed by the brain whether or not it is a person‟s locus. Neuhaus claims that we perceive place or space with the ear as much as the eye, claiming “what the eye perceives is more concrete; whereas, what the ear perceives is immaterial. This potentially makes it more powerful.”12 Intentionality plays an important role in destroying the earlier-discussed egocentric predicament. It affirms not only does an external reality exist, but an individual perspective is able to know and engage with it. A shared, external reality also re-enforces the idea of the public individual or the public ego. Our actions do not take place in a void separate from others nor does even our pondering or reasoning—all of this is correlated between the individual and the world. Phenomenology asserts that reasoning in the life of a human is a public thing: “It is not enclosed in the solitude or privacy of a „sphere of consciousness.‟ It is expressed in manifest conduct and achievements, in human beings who are walking around, talking to one another, examining scientific instruments, focusing a laser beam on a target, digging a trench at an archeological site, writing a letter to a friend, trying to persuade someone to vote for a certain proposal. Is it present in words, pictures, and flags…It is the rational animal, not the solitary awareness, not the large, hollow sphere of consciousness, that enters into rational life. The public life of reason is lived by the transcendental ego, who is also a public entity.”13 Phenomenology‟s idea of the public ego can be seen quite clearly in the communal qualities of Neuhaus‟s moment pieces. For one, their placement is often within a certain geographical community, with a sound tailored for the space. 12
Max Neuhaus - Times Square, directed by Rory Logsdail, 2002. Robert Sokolowski, Introduction to Phenomenology (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 119. 13
“Neuhaus organized earlier time pieces in such a way that the moment of silence occurred at familiar times of day, on the hour, the half hour. An obvious reference here is the church bells that summon the faithful to worship at fixed times and contribute, wherever they are heard, to the formation of a sense of community.”14 This approach is apparent especially in his Time Piece Stommeln which is placed near an abandoned synagogue and is activated twelve times daily in accordance with Jewish law. Commenting on the synagogue‟s use of the bell when the facility was still active, Neuhaus states that “if you were outside the sound of the bell, you had no information; you were outside the community.”15 Thus, many of the time pieces serve as a reminder of current community or—in the case of Time Piece Stommeln—a community that has been lost. Phenomenology has a relatively conservative view of abstraction. It claims the modern person uses it too frequently and inappropriately. “We can speak about pitch without mentioning sound; we can refer to hue without mentioning color; we can talk about vision without mentioning the eye.”16 This is possible, because language allows us to segment and extract a whole into parts. It is, of course, impossible to experience pitch without sound or hue without color, but language allows a person to segment and extract reality into pieces. The danger in this—the danger that phenomenology warns of—is that a person may come to understand these parts as existing independently. This would seriously hamper an individual‟s ability to perceive and reason correctly.
14
Ulrich Loock, "The Time Piece for the Stommeln Synagogue"," Max Neuhaus Website, 2007, http://www.max-neuhaus.info/ (accessed May 2, 2010). 15 Max Neuhaus, Max Neuhaus: Sound Works, Vol. I, II vols. (Ostfildern: Cantz Verlag, 1994), 100. 16 Robert Sokolowski, Introduction to Phenomenology (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 24.
“People are always wanting to record these sounds, because we are so used to making a product out of sound. To record a sound like this and think of it as a reproduction of the artwork is as silly as scraping all the paint off of a painting, putting it in a box, and saying, „here‟s the painting‟.”17 In this quote, Neuhaus puts forth a warning very similar to that of phenomenology regarding abstraction. A Cartesian mindset is tempted to dismantle the whole into separate parts, thinking that analysis or appreciation is possible when the parts are perceived separate from one another. Phenomenology asserts this severely hamstrings the whole and stilts the perception of reality. Likewise, Neuhaus‟ asserts this destroys his artwork. Phenomenology has a term for the default mode in which we experience the world and things in the world. It is called the natural attitude. In this mode, there are assumptions made in order to navigate a complex, layered reality. Philosophical reflection is not present in the natural attitude. To this point, the natural attitude is sometimes classified as prephilosophical. The philosophical attitude is the called the phenomenological attitude: “When we move into the phenomenological attitude, we become something like detached observers of the passing scene or like spectators at a game. We become onlookers. We contemplate the involvements we have with the world and with things in it, and we contemplate the world in its human involvement. We are no longer simply participants in the world; we contemplate what it is to be a participant in the world and in manifestations.”18 This is perhaps the most interesting aspect of the time pieces. All the phenomenological attributes of the time pieces that have been mentioned so far play a part in triggering a shift in philosophical perspective. Neuhaus never explicitly connects his work with phenomenology, but
17
Time Piece Stommeln, directed by Werner Hannappel, 2007. Robert Sokolowski, Introduction to Phenomenology (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 48. 18
much of the commentary he provides dances around the subject of how his works affect a subject‟s perspective. “I see these works not as definers of a single frame of mind for all individuals, but as catalysts for shifts in frames of mind.”19 As can be seen in the letter-to-the-editor at the beginning of this paper, the subject experienced this intended shift while experience Neuhaus‟s Times Square—a place piece. As the subject traversed a busy, public space, he noticed something—a subtly improbable sound. In trying to comprehend the sound, he shifted from the natural attitude into the phenomenological. He bracketed the sound to study it. In so doing he undoubtedly had to consider other sounds in the space, other people in the space, his own participation in the space. This experience is repeated in the area of Neuhaus‟s time pieces—only the experience of place is heightened. Should the subject ever hear the improbable sound of a time piece, it is likely within a few seconds of the sound suddenly disappearing. Otherwise, the subject only notices the sudden cessation—not the actual sound of the piece. In either case, the subject enters the phenomenological attitude without the presence of the probable sound. Instead, in the sound‟s absence, the subject‟s phenomenological focus is on the sound of the surrounding space and, thusly, the surrounding space itself. Both Neuhaus and phenomenology also account for the inevitable lack of transcendental reduction in some of the subjects of the time pieces. In other words, phenomenology and the time pieces are not invalidated or unsuccessful if the subject does not experience a philosophical shift or even should the subject fail to notice the artwork. “The piece isn‟t meant to startle…In fact, I never do a work where everybody stops and notices it in a public space. I want about fifty 19
Lynn Cooke, "Introduction," in Max Neuhaus: Times Square, Time Piece Beacon, 23-27 (New York: Yale University Press, 2009), 23.
percent of the people who walk through it to not notice it.” 20 Furthermore, Neuhaus claims the aesthetic experience is a natural one that needs no indoctrination.21 Built into the pieces then is a space and dignity for the natural attitude, how surroundings are naturally perceived by humans. This rings true for phenomenology. Often this feature of phenomenology is viewed by its proponents as a means of trumping other modern philosophies. “One of the dangers to philosophy is that it may think that it can replace the prephilosophical life…The most important contribution phenomenology has made to culture and the intellectual life is to have validated the truth of prephilosophical life, experience, and thinking. There must be true opinion, there must be prior doxa [default acceptance of self-evident truths], if there is to be philosophy. Classical Greek and medieval thought understood that prephilosophical reason achieves truth and evidence, and that philosophical reflection comes afterward and does not disturb what goes before it…Phenomenology joins this classical understanding…”22 The prephilosophical life could be equated to the pre-conceptual engagement of a subject with a time piece. Neuhaus, in his lean toward a more democratic reception of art, was interested in validating basic connections subjects may (or may not) have with his work. It is true that any piece of art—or any thing, for that matter—can be viewed in a phenomenological framework. This is the point of the philosophy. However, very few artworks contain the elements and goals that foster the shift from the natural attitude to the phenomenological attitude. Even fewer represent so well the tenants of phenomenology. To analyze or appreciate the time pieces, it would seem impossible to fully do so without a grasp of
20
Max Neuhaus - Times Square, directed by Rory Logsdail, 2002. Max Neuhaus, The Institutional Beast, Vol. I, in Max Neuhaus: Sound Works, 80-84 (Ostfildern: Cantz Verlag, 1994), 82. 22 Robert Sokolowski, Introduction to Phenomenology (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 63-64. 21
phenomenological thought. I suspect this understanding could successfully be applied to Neuhaus‟s entire body of work. Unfortunately, many commentators and critics hang onto the what-was-once-unique ideas of how Neuhaus shaped sound to shape space. Critics then lump him in with the minimalist visual artists of the late 1960‟s, and laud him for his defying of disciplinary classifications. In other words, he becomes another piece in the art historical narrative of the avant garde. The actual experience of his works, how it subtly or overtly affects the populace—which seemed to be of concern to Neuhaus—is rarely explored in-depth.
BIBLIOGRAPHY Cascella, Daniela. "Max Neuhaus." Contemporary 75 (2005): 38-39. Cooke, Lynn. "Introduction." In Max Neuhaus: Times Square, Time Piece Beacon, 23-27. New York: Yale University Press, 2009. Loock, Ulrich. "The Time Piece for the Stommeln Synagogue"." Max Neuhaus Website. 2007. http://www.max-neuhaus.info/ (accessed May 2, 2010). Max Neuhaus - Times Square. Directed by Rory Logsdail. Produced by Firefly Pictures. Performed by Max Neuhaus. 2002. —. Max Neuhaus: Sound Works. Vol. I. II vols. Ostfildern: Cantz Verlag, 1994. Neuhaus, Max. The Institutional Beast. Vol. I, in Max Neuhaus: Sound Works, 80-84. Ostfildern: Cantz Verlag, 1994. Time Piece Stommeln. Directed by Werner Hannappel. Performed by Max Neuhaus. 2007. Pakesh, Peter and Ulrich Loock. "A Talk between Peter Pakesh and Ulrch Loock about Max Neuhaus's Time Pieces." Max Neuhaus Website. 2007. http://max-neuhaus.info (accessed May 13, 2010). Ross, Steven. "Aural Remembrance." Art in America, December 2009: 24. Sokolowski, Robert. Introduction to Phenomenology. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000. Time Piece Graz - Kunsthaus Graz. 2010. http://www.museumjoanneum.at/en/kunsthaus/time_piece_graz (accessed May 15, 2010). Weber, Bruce. "Max Neuhaus, Who Made Aural Artwork, Dies at 69." The New York Times, February 9, 2009.