Joan Jonas

Strange exhibition at Tate Modern looking at the career of Joan Jonas, a pioneer of performance art.
 
I say strange because it’s quite hard to represent performance art in a static show without the artist. This gave a good flavour but felt a bit quiet and clinical. Also I don’t really get performance art and lose patience with it quite quickly.

I did like the theatre boxes, long boxes showing video at the far end and with objects in the foregrounds. They were a novel way of showing video art and reminded me of Dutch illusion boxes. I also liked the wall of objects and masks Jonas uses in her work.

It’s a couple of weeks since I saw the show and not a lot of it has stayed with me. I was amused by a video of Jonas dancing alone in her studio expect for the rather quizzical dog.


 
Closes on 5 August 2018
 
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