''Seedbed'' is a
performance piece first performed by
Vito Acconci
Vito Acconci (, ; January 24, 1940 – April 27, 2017) was an influential American performance, video and installation artist, whose diverse practice eventually included sculpture, architectural design, and landscape design. His foundational p ...
on 15–29 January 1972 at
Sonnabend Gallery
Ileana Sonnabend (née Schapira, October 29, 1914 – October 21, 2007) was a Romanian-American art dealer of 20th-century art. The Sonnabend Gallery opened in Paris in 1962 and was instrumental in making American art of the 1960s known in Europe, ...
in
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...
.
In the piece, there is a low wooden ramp merging with the floor. The ramp extends across the width of the room, beginning two feet up the side of one wall and slanting down to the middle of the floor.
In his original performance of the piece, Acconci lay hidden underneath the ramp installed at the Sonnabend Gallery, masturbating. The artist's spoken fantasies about the visitors walking above him were heard through loudspeakers in the gallery.
"In this legendary sculpture/performance Acconci lay beneath a ramp built in the Sonnabend Gallery. Over the course of three weeks, he masturbated eight hours a day while murmuring things like, "You're pushing your cunt down on my mouth" or "You're ramming your cock down into my ass." Not only does the architectural intervention presage much of his subsequent work, but all of Acconci's fixations converge in this, the spiritual sphincter of his art. In ''Seedbed'', Acconci is the producer and the receiver of the work's pleasure. He is simultaneously public and private, making marks yet leaving little behind, and demonstrating ultra-awareness of his viewer while being in a semi-trance state." -
Jerry Saltz
Jerry Saltz (born February 19, 1951, in Chicago, Illinois) is an American art critic. Since 2006, he has been senior art critic and columnist for '' New York'' magazine. Formerly the senior art critic for ''The Village Voice'', he received the ...
A video of the piece shows Acconci masturbating.
Marina Abramović
Marina Abramović ( sr-Cyrl, Марина Абрамовић, ; born November 30, 1946) is a Serbian conceptual and performance artist. Her work explores body art, endurance art, feminist art, the relationship between the performer and audi ...
performed ''Seedbed'' as part of her ''
Seven Easy Pieces'' in 2005. In 2013, Dale Eisinger of
''Complex'' ranked ''Seedbed'' the 22nd best work of performance art in history.
References
External links
Guggenheim Press Release on ''Seven Easy Pieces'' as interpreted by Marina Abramović- Nov.9-15, 2005
1972 in New York City
1972 works
Male masturbation
Performances
1970s in Manhattan
Performance art in New York City
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