The Unwritten History Project Detail Record

Detail Record for Tehching Hsieh

Event Title: One Year Performance (Living Outside)
Series Title:
Location:
Date: 2/16/1983 - 3/12/1983
Event Type: Installation

Event Documentation:

One Year Performance	One Year Performance	One Year Performance	One Year Performance
One Year Performance	One Year Performance	One Year Performance	One Year Performance
One Year Performance	One Year Performance	One Year Performance	One Year Performance

Artist Statement: SEPTEMBER, 1981 STATEMENT I, SAM HSIEH, plan to do a one year performance piece. I shall stay outdoors for one year, never go inside. I shall not go in to a building, subway, train, car, airplane, ship, cave, tent. I shall have a sleeping bag. The performance shall begin on September 26, 1981 at 2 P.M. and continue until September 26, 1982 at 2 P.M. SAM HSIEH

Bio:

Press Release: Proposal for exhibition installation at Franklin Furnace ONE YEAR PERFORMANCE by SAM TECHING HSIEH Outdoor Piece - September 26, 1981 - September 25, 1982 From September 1981 through September 1982, Sam Teching Hsieh will perform his third one year performance work entitled OUTDOOR PIECE. During this time, he will live completely outside, never in any way seeking shelter indoors. For Hsieh, the year is a symbol for life, the complete rotation of the earth around the sun. In realizing his performance over the period of a year, his art and his life become the same: the theatre of his performance becomes the theatre for his survival. His existential obsession with reality has made him investigate the struggles of the often mundane details of daily life. His art in this way becomes a metaphor for his existence, the expression of his experience of an artist in exile. Included in the exhibition will be the daily diary/maps that Hsieh kept to detail certain vital activities necessary to his survival. Also, as a visual documentation of his work, Hsieh would each day photograph himself by setting up a camera on a tripod with a timer, almost as a way to reaffirm for himself his own existence. With this series of photographs, Hsieh will create his own pictorial calendar installation of his year long performance. There is also a film in progress that will document certain moments of the work. Ideally, Hsieh would like to end the piece by opening the exhibition on the last day of his performance. His first act of going inside would be like re-entering the womb after a year's absence, surrounded by the images of his life/art. The importance of the exhibition will be in bringing this sometimes inaccessible work to a larger public and in this way attempt to clarify the philosophical impulses of Hsieh's work and allow him to establish a broader dialogue with his audience. Proposal for exhibition installation at Franklin Furnace ONE YEAR PERFORMANCE by SAM TECHING HSIEH Outdoor Piece - September 26, 1981 - September 25, 1982 From September 1981 through September 1982, Sam Teching Hsieh will perform his third one year performance work entitled OUTDOOR PIECE. During this time, he will live completely outside, never in any way seeking shelter indoors. For Hsieh, the year is a symbol for life, the complete rotation of the earth around the sun. In realizing his performance over the period of a year, his art and his life become the same: the theatre of his performance becomes the theatre for his survival. His existential obsession with reality has made him investigate the struggles of the often mundane details of daily life. His art in this way becomes a metaphor for his existence, the expression of his experience of an artist in exile. Included in the exhibition will be the daily diary/maps that Hsieh kept to detail certain vital activities necessary to his survival. Also, as a visual documentation of his work, Hsieh would each day photograph himself by setting up a camera on a tripod with a timer, almost as a way to reaffirm for himself his own existence. With this series of photographs, Hsieh will create his own pictorial calendar installation of his year long performance. There is also a film in progress that will document certain moments of the work. Ideally, Hsieh would like to end the piece by opening the exhibition on the last day of his performance. His first act of going inside would be like re-entering the womb after a year's absence, surrounded by the images of his life/art. The importance of the exhibition will be in bringing this sometimes inaccessible work to a larger public and in this way attempt to clarify the philosophical impulses of Hsieh's work and allow him to establish a broader dialogue with his audience.

Proposal Information:

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