Tehching Hsieh - one year performance

Less than a week ago I had one of the best days of my life, a day with a very special person and the most amazing visit to the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. I have been so busy with my day to day life that I have put my passion for art on a back burner, something that surely changed after this day. For 3 straight hours we walked the 6 floors of the Museum just drooling at the pieces and taking one photograph after another. As we reached the 5th and 6th floor, I was blown away… I was suddenly inches away from the most inspiring artists such as Miró, Matisse, Picasso, Warhol, Pollock, Dalí, Kandisky (made me tear), Rousseau, Gauguin, Cézanne, Van Gogh and many many others… incredible, so hard to describe how amazing it made me feel.

Having said that, there was one piece of modern art that really caught my attention… a chinese artist named Tehching Hsieh who’s passion for art just blew me away. Hsieh’s art is most known as “one-year-performances” and that is exactly what he has done, unique artistic perfomances that last exactly 1 year. The one on display dates back to 1978 where Hsieh vowed to “seal himself in his studio, in solitary confinement inside a cell-room measuring 11′6 x 9 x 8.” for one complete year. During this time, Hsieh would not converse, read, write, listen to the radio or watch tv until he “unsealed” himself a year later. A friend of his would visit him daily, to take food, clean clothes, pick up his waste (yes, he would shit in a bucket) and take a daily picture of him. Read the rest of this entry »