Every person has different interests and may not be automatically intrigued by the arts. When explaining Marina Abramovic to people it is important to look at her performances individually to discover the connections they make to other subjects. Her life’s work produces great examples of said connections. The work titled “Rhythm 0” is a great example of an interdisciplinary piece of art. In “Rhythm 0” Marina crosses topics such as biology, psychology, sociology, and spirituality. The setting of this piece is Marina as a passive individual, allowing the audience to pick from a variety of objects and use these things or do whatever they would like to her. The audience is given full power to push or pull Marina’s boundaries to their liking, which causes outcomes that touch on a multitude of subjects.
Biologically speaking, Marina experiences pain throughout this experiment as some audience members use items that can hurt her. Bleeding, bruises and pain are symptoms of overstepping physical boundaries, which science can now explain. By allowing the audience to chose what they would like to do to her, the performance becomes a study in sociology. It becomes a question of how far people will go and when they realize enough is enough. Psychology comes into play when looking at how Marina pushes her own personal and internal boundaries. Despite the urge to have an emotional reaction to everything that is done to her, she pushes her mental limits to remain passive and continue to allow the audience to poke and prod her to their every desire. Spirituality is probably one of the most important topics Marina incorporates into “Rhythm 0”. As many wise spiritual leaders have done in the past, Marina takes this experience of suffering as an opportunity to transcend her human form, and find her own personal nirvana. The performance comes to a dramatic conclusion when someone finally decides to hold a loaded gun to Marina’s head, at this point the security guard decides the boundaries have long been crossed and it should end.
Biologically speaking, Marina experiences pain throughout this experiment as some audience members use items that can hurt her. Bleeding, bruises and pain are symptoms of overstepping physical boundaries, which science can now explain. By allowing the audience to chose what they would like to do to her, the performance becomes a study in sociology. It becomes a question of how far people will go and when they realize enough is enough. Psychology comes into play when looking at how Marina pushes her own personal and internal boundaries. Despite the urge to have an emotional reaction to everything that is done to her, she pushes her mental limits to remain passive and continue to allow the audience to poke and prod her to their every desire. Spirituality is probably one of the most important topics Marina incorporates into “Rhythm 0”. As many wise spiritual leaders have done in the past, Marina takes this experience of suffering as an opportunity to transcend her human form, and find her own personal nirvana. The performance comes to a dramatic conclusion when someone finally decides to hold a loaded gun to Marina’s head, at this point the security guard decides the boundaries have long been crossed and it should end.