Was ist Kunst? (What is Art?) is the title of a series of performances by
Raša Todosijeviæ held in the period between 1976 and 1981 in various settings. In the two video versions we only see a silent woman and hear the artist’s husky, powerful voice whispering, shouting, screaming, pleading, begging, simply asking the same question over and over again. The literal meaning of the question What is Art? is confronted with the absence of its performative impact through automatic repetitions: the indefinite recurrence of the same question which stands for an (elocutionary) verbal act related to the question. Since there’s no response about what art is, we become aware that the idea of the performance lies in the inversion of power relations within the art system. If the semantics of a speech act include part of its pragmatics, then
Todosijeviæ’s aim is to empower the speech position of an artist who claims
power to control his own discourse, depriving the art system of its authority to define art.

Dragoljub – Raša Todosijević

* 1945 Beograd, SCG
lives and works in Beograd, SCG

Exhibitions (selection)

2005 Essence of Life – Essence of Art, The State Tretyakov Gallery, Moskwa, RUS

2004 Lodz Biennale, Lodz, PL

2003-2004 Parallel Action, Austrian Cultural Forum, NYC,USA.

2002 Retrospective show, Museum of Contemporary Art Belgrade, Beograd, SCG

2000 – 2001 After the Wall - Art and culture in post-communist Europe, Nationalgalerie – Museum für Gegenwart im Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin, D

1993 Remember Yugoslavia, General Idea, New York, USA

1984 V Biennale of Sydney, AUS

1982, XVI Biennale de Sao Paolo, BR

1977 Was ist Kunst?, International Performance Festival, Österreichischer Kunstverein, Wien, A

1972 “Place”, “Sculpture” and “Sign” (Open Area, Action) ,Beograd, SCG

bibliography (selection):

RAŠA TODOSIJEVIĆ: Was ist Kunst. Hrsg. Von Dejan Sretenović. Beograd: Geopoetika 2001

Bojana Pejić´: „Belgrad oder das Paradox als Bedingung der Existenz“. Focus Belgrad Berlin: IFA Galerie, 1998

Hvala Raši Todosijeviću, Thank you, Raši Todosijević: Muzej savremene umetnostis, Beograd, Museum of Cemtemporary Art, Belgrade,.2002

Kristine Stiles: Uncorrupted Joy: International Art Actions. Out of Actions, Between Performance and the Object, 1949 -1979, Thames and Hudson, New Yirk 1998, pg. 227-329

Ješa Denegri: „Razlog za drugu liniju“. Jugoslovenska dokumenta ´89, Olimpijski centar „Skenderija“, Sarajevoa 1989