Fried, Koss & theater

In reading Fried's "Art and Objecthood" I was struck by his use of the word theater in reference to minimalist, or what he calls literalist art. As someone who has worked in the theater most of my life, I was not at all sure what he meant by the term. He says that literalist objecthood is a plea for a new genre of theater, and theater is now a negation of art. He describes the experience of  literalist art is that it is in a situation which includes the beholder. ( I also wondered at his use of the word beholder, rather than viewer - the definition of behold is to observe a thing or person, especially an impressive one.) This strikes me as inherently not-theater; theater requires a performer, an audience, and some kind of internal or external action. I suppose that the object could become the audience, and the beholder could be the actor, the one who acts. But if the minimalist sculpture just sits there, and no action occurs, I'm not sure that I understand this as theater.

Fried references both Brecht and Artaud, both of whom were in vogue in theater circle, certainly in academic theater, in the late 60s and 70s, when Fried wrote this piece. I found my copy of "The Theater and its Double", by Antoinin Artaud which I have hung onto almost like a talisman since my undergraduate days - here is a quote.

"We must believe in a sense of life renewed by the theater, a sense of life in which man fearlessly makes himself master of what does not yet exist, and brings it into being. And everything that has not been born can still be brought to life if we are not satisfied to remain mere recording organisms. 

Furthermore, when we speak the word “life”, it must be understood we are not referring to life as we know it from its surface of fact, but to that fragile, fluctuating, center which forms never reach. And if there is still one hellish, truly accursed thing in our time, it is our artistic dallying with forms, instead of being like victims burnt at the stake, signaling through the flames."

It is interesting that Juliet Koss also references the theater, and specifically Bertolt Brecht who came up with the theory of alienation to combat what he saw as "empathy theater" that relied on the suspension of disbelief. He felt that empathy in the theater encouraged identification, and prevented the spectator from critical thought, and more importantly political action. (He was of course writing during the rise of Nazism in Germany.) Brecht did admit that both "distancing and absorption" were necessary; "this type of art also generates emotions; such performances facilitate the mastering of reality: and this it is that moves the spectator."