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Programme: accepted abstracts

Abstract ID: 279

Part of Session 128: Sociofuckinglinguistics (Other abstracts in this session)

Taboo Art: Taking a Transgressive Stance

Authors: Jaworski, Adam
Submitted by: Jaworski, Adam (The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong S.A.R. (China))

As a semiotic, art holds a special position in the human communicative system. Often associated with the liminal and liminoid spaces of the ritual and the carnivalesque, touching on both the sacred and the profane, held in high esteem yet often perceived as outside of ‘normal’ life, art and artists appear to have a prerogative to deal with topics that are commonly perceived as a taboo, for example death, sex, religion, politics and violence. This paper attempts to tease out the notion of ‘taboo art’ as a means of saying the unsayable and commenting on the socially repressed or institutionally censored themes and activities, including those of artistic self-expression. Taboo topics, acts and activities can be portrayed as overt performances (staged, painterly, photographic, etc.), as recontextualized texts and practices previously censored or hidden from view, or as accessible only through complex inferential processes. Depending on the specific subject matter, level of explicitness and socio-cultural frame of the display, these works of art are judged as regards their transgressive stance, i.e. the degree to which they are deemed to offend, shock, or otherwise contravene the ‘accepted’ norms of good taste or social conduct. Typically, the uptake and polemic with the transgressive stance of taboo art is played out in public through the mass media giving voice to individuals and groups opposed to the ideological significance of the artwork. The semiotic analysis of taboo art and the metadiscourses around it need to be considered in terms of the three main communicative functions suggested by Halliday: ideational (what is put on display or hidden from view), interpersonal (who gets affected by it including who gets ‘shocked’, and for what purpose), and textual, including aesthetic, poetic and metadiscursive (what are the formal means and materials used for taboo breaking or creating its shock value). Illustrative and analytic examples include the works of such artists as Marina Abramović, Laurie Anderson, Chris Burden, Marine Hugonnier, Jenny Holzer, Mike Kelley, Robert Mapplethorpe, Chris Offili, David Shrigley, and David Wojnarowicz, among others.