ABSTRACT
This chapter thinks through de Certeau’s concepts of ‘the institution of the real’ and ‘the institution of rot’, as well as drawing directly on artist’s statements and personal interviews to understand the transformations and critiques of power that occur when artists perform in institutional spaces. Case studies encompass an empty factory, a former asylum, and Carriageworks, a multi-venue arts and performance space, all of which were occupied by site-specific performances by Chen Chieh-Jen (Taiwan) and Mike Parr (Australia). These artists explore the potential to reconfigure and resignify institutions and repurpose public spaces, while revealing resistances of memory and the material traces of the lives lived in these places. In doing so, this chapter details three contrasting artworks that provoke questions about the relationship between art and institutions – and its multiple meanings, political contradictions and fraught resonances for reconfiguring political institutions. The 20th Biennale of Sydney (BoS) is also analysed for how it re-framed and reclaimed the idea of an ‘embassy’ from governmental institutions for art spaces in 2016. What happens to institutional sites when they are rebranded, taken over by an artwork, and repurposed?
