Urban Interventions
When surveying models of participatory art in the professional field, many of them often seem unattached to the 'real'. Even when placed in actual locations, any impact of the most successful of these public events and interventions stems from novelty as well as a disruption of routine use of public and private space. These interventions lose their innovative edge by playing upon the myths of the post-industrial city, where artists and the marginal inhabitants reminds the former-farm boy investment banker that he is not in Kansas anymore. I believe that in order to surpass mere novelty, these disturbances and routine-disruptions must involve the fully conscious activation and contributions of participants, moving beyond the entertainment values one gets from the gallery visit or pleasure of the urbanite who by chance has her morning walk to the subway temporarily made strange. Indeed, these types of events merely confirm the status quo by providing a sort of hipness-by-proximity that is one of the reasons many city-dwellers suffer the small but multiple humiliations of urban living.
-S
