Art is not just about another beautiful painting that matches your dining room floor. Art has to be disturbing, art has to ask a question, art has to predict the future.
- Marina Abramović
Marina Abramović is a daring and charismatic performance artist, known for using her body as the subject and medium for raw and physically challenging performance pieces. Her work often engages and touches her audience in transcendental ways. Viewers often feel an exchange of energy or a sense that the artist is reaching into their souls.
Chair for the Spirit Chair for Man is a poetic work on paper inspired by her 1997 interactive installation at MoMA's P.S.1 for the inauguration of their exhibition space. Abramović believed that a new house should have furniture for both spirits and humans. In honor of the new space, she created a spirit chair mounted high above the human chair in the gallery. Visitors were invited to take part in the installation by sitting in the human chair with the intention that this interaction would trigger their own physical or mental experiences.