Performance Art Is Back: Julie Atlas Muz Focuses on Fun/Body

The body is a funny medium. With all its sex and blood and less comely functions, the gross-out factor is easy and built-in. And with our Western body-versus-mind mentality, body art is just as easily dismissed as something less than sublime. The paradox is that work about the body executed via the body will always retain relevance, at least until we evolve into some sort of Burroughsian post-human.

Performance art is supposed to be fun again.

The mock pop stardom of Fischerspooner is the obvious example, so successful that Casey Spooner and Warren Fischer have indeed become stars as well as respected artists.

Elements of vaudeville and burlesque lighten the mood, but keep the focus on the body.

While Julie Atlas Muz may be easier to watch than the Viennese Aktionists, she's essentially addressing the same issues, making us re-evaluate and celebrate everyday bodily functions, turning them into contemporary myth.