Response to Documentation of Selected Works

Response to Chris Burden’s Documentation of Selected Works

From the title of Chris Burden’s video, Documentation of Selected Works, I knew that I would be watching a piece consisting of several different clips. But aside from that, I did not know what to expect from Burden’s work. At the beginning of the video, I was not very interested. Chris Burden just occupied the screen, explaining his work. He wasn’t even a good speaker; he didn’t enunciate properly and kept hesitating as if he was making up his speech at the moment of filming (which he probably was).
But my disinterest quickly disappeared as he began showing his different works. The first work, 220, caught me by surprise. My initial reaction when Burden was explaining the concept and execution was, “What the heck are you doing?! Someone could die!” I was incredulous at the stupidity of Burden and his colleagues. All it would take was for one person to slip for the “art” to end in tragedy. I really did not feel that the stunt Burden and his colleagues performed qualified as art. The whole performance just seemed like a sick science experiment where the subjects are forced to cling on to their ladders or risk falling to their deaths. Is 220 really considered art? It seems more like torture.
As the film went on, I repeatedly experienced the sentiment that Chris Burden was being extremely stupid. It seems he was deliberately experiencing pain and putting himself in dangerous situations in order to produce his “sculptures.” Even though he had a small audience for many of his works, I think Burden really craved the attention. And he achieved this by recording his exploits on film. Why else would he let himself get shot in the arm? What purpose does it serve performing a “fire roll”? In fact, Burden even admits that he enjoyed the knowledge that 250,000 television viewers would be disturbed by the ten-second television ad that aired for a month. It was his way of shocking the world and expressing art.
As I continued to watch Burden’s stunt, I constantly wore a grimace as I imagined the type of pain the artist was putting himself in. In clips like Through the Night Softly and Velvet Water, I was horrified at the damage Burden was inflicting on his own body. Although Burden may have accepted, or even savored, the pain as part of his performance, I just knew that the man’s performance was definitely hurting him. And that is probably just what Burden wanted to achieve. By putting himself in such obviously painful situations, Burden is able to capture his audience’s attention. His audience may be horrified by his art, but his spectators are unable to turn away for the disturbing images Burden has created.