How to Provide an Artistic Service: An Introduction

<p>In our initial proposal for “Services,” Helmut Draxler and I offered the term “service” to describe what appeared to be a determining feature of what has come to be called “project work.” We wrote:</p> <blockquote><p>It appears to us that, related variously to institutional critique, productivist, activist and political documentary traditions as well post-studio, site-specific and/or public art activities, the practices currently characterized as ‘project work’ do not necessarily share a thematic, ideological or procedural basis. What they do seem to share is the fact that they all involve expending an amount of labor which is either in excess of, or independent of, any specific material production and which cannot be transacted as or along with a product. This labor, which in economic terms would be called service provision (as opposed to goods production), may include:</p> <ul> <li>‘the work of the interpretation or analysis of sites and situations in and outside of cultural institutions;</li> <li>the work of presentation and installation;</li> <li>the work of public education in and outside of cultural institutions;</li> <li>advocacy and other community based work, including organizing, education, documentary production and the creation of alternative structures.</li> </ul> </blockquote> <p>“Providing a service,” in this sense, is neither an intention (such as benefiting society) attributed to particular artists nor a content (such as museum education or security) characterizing a group of works. Rather, we proposed “service provision” to describe the economic condition of project work as well as the nature of the social relations under which it is carried out…</p>