Chicana Ways - Aletta

AnyBody's Concerns 6(2003)
the same time. Through his recourse to ancient rites, which he
aestheticizes and presents in pseudo-priestly fashion, he
evokes a shared cultural past but strips the individual
ritualized act of the religious circumstances and community
which alone justify it. His actions have a close affinity to
Georges Bataille's theorizing on the social function of
violence and sacrificial rites, by which societies, according
to Bataille, achieve periodic moments of unity with a
basically violent and excessive nature through a temporal
suspension of the rules of rationality.
19 Similar to Yves Klein, Nitsch insists on the
theatricality of his performance actions, which seem to hold
the promise of catharsis for the audience (even though
violence and pain are only simulated). Nitsch's reasoning with
regard to sacrifice reveals his self-assessment as a messianic
figure:
Ich nehme durch meine Kunstproduktion (Form der Lebensandacht)
das scheinbar Negative, Unappetitliche, Perverse, Obszöne, die
Brunst und die daraus resultierende Opfer-Hysterie auf mich,
damit IHR EUCH den befleckten, schamlosen Abstieg ins Extrem
erspart" (Nitsch cited in Schneede 139).
[Through my art production (a form of life worship) I take
upon myself the apparently negative, unappetizing, perverse,
obscene, the lust and the resulting sacrificial hysteria so
that YOU are spared the stained, shameless descent into
extremes.]
That an aesthetic programme like Nitsch's can corroborate self-
stylizations as a (male) hero and figure of pathos is
confirmed by Peter Weibel's comment on his 1971 performance
http://www.genderforum.uni-koeln.de/anybody/gutenberg.html (19 van 60)31-3-2005 18:21:57