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| '''Masterclass Anthony McCall '''
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| Monday 29th of October we went with all the 1ste years of Media Design & Communication to the exhibition and masterclass of Anthony McCall. Before we went their we read two articles to get an insight about him and his work.
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| What first caught my attention when reading the articles was McCall’s 20 years of inactivity as an artist between the 70s and the 90s. How is it possible to take a break of 20 years, return and be as successful as before? This is interesting, cause I’m told that to survive in the art world, its is important to stay active.
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| Initially McCall worked as a performer making shapes and figures and lighting them up with fire. In 1973 McCall made his keywork ‘Line Describing a Cone’. It was his first work were he could implement his ideas about the relationship between audience and work and about film as a medium. Film is usually seen as a carrier of information. Information is stored on film and the film is projected on a screen or wall and displays the content. In McCall’s work the lightbeams of the film are the work itself. He works with basic shapes and match them together to form huge three-dimensional works when projected. Initially his works were horizontal, from one point to another, but after his 20 years break he developed vertical works. In these works light was projected from the ceiling to the ground. The vertical works became possible due to technological improvements of the projectors. In the 70s projectors where carrying rolls of film which had to be in a certain position to be played. Current projectors are digital and don’t need film as an input. It gave McCall the possibility to experiment more with the position of the projectors. On the other hand the digital projectors missed a certain quality which film possess. This is a typical example of the debate about analog and digital and its differences in qualities. As a photographer I face this debate from time to time. And I must say I like the quality of film, its grain and colors. If I have to describe what film has and what digital is missing then I would call it soul. On the other hand, in my current works I need the digital format, because it is faster.
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| The audience in the work of McCall plays a key role. In traditional film screenings audience is asked to come at a certain time to a specific place. Every person gets a seat and is expected to watch the content of the film from beginning to end. In McCall's work this is different. First of all his works are sculptures and the sculpture is formed during a certain set of time. For McCall its not so important that people come at a certain time and watch the sculpture formed from begin to end. Instead, McCall wants the audience to decide that for themselves; they are free to come and go whenever they want. His works are about exploring the movement of lines into shapes and the engagement you as the audience can take with it. And I must say it was mind blowing walking in the exhibition experiencing his work. I dived into it as a little kid and experienced the ‘walls’ of light as physical walls you can jump over or crawl under it. I didn't waited till a certain works was about to start, nor did I watched one till its end, but the feeling of being consumed by light, to get the feeling of touching the light was great.
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| '''The audience as contributors to a piece of art'''
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| Now I want to talk about the audience as contributors to a piece of art. I like the way how McCall involves the audience in his works and that the audience is free to decide how to engage in it. You can watch or experience the works of McCall from a distance and from close. You can go into it passively or play with the lightbeams his films create. I think his work attracts young and old people and is therefore a perfect example of an art work made for a broad range of people. In my opinion McCall’s work does not discriminate. You can enjoy his work while having a lot of knowledge about art and you can enjoy his work without any knowledge of art. His works are to me very accessible.
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| In McCall’s case the audience forms and distorts the projected shapes by going in and out of the beam. The more people there are, the more the beam gets distorted. By this the initial art work gets another form in a certain context and time. Also the total amount of people (the audience) are forming a certain population that interacts on each other's movements. By that they are in a way performing in and around the works.
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| I very much like this quality of McCall’s work cause I try to implement that also in my own work. For my work it is important that people engage in it during the process. In fact my work doesn't exist without engagement of certain groups of people. In most cases people do engage but I still need to understand what it means and how to get it to a next level. I need to understand the psychology behind it.
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