The Tragicomic Hero
By Michael Conti
Master of Fine Arts Thesis
Art Institute of Boston
June 2010
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Abstract
This paper addresses my art-making practice within the context of the sports arena, the
landscape and tragicomic heroic endeavors. It will attempt to describe the development of my
work through an autobiographical narrative and will also contextualize my work within the
contemporary art world. Finally this paper will reference the work of philosophers and critics
from the 19th to the 21st centuries in relationship to concepts that arise in the work.
By pursuing in part an autobiographical approach, the intent of this thesis is to try to
explain the parallels between the athlete, the artist and the actor as performers that reveal
contradictions in the artist as well as society.
An argument is made visualizing the link between
the process of play and creativity. The performer acts out fears and desires; triumph and failure;
comedy and tragedy for audience just as the fans in the stadium live the triumphs and tragedies
of the players on the field.
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Table of Contents
I. Introduction
4
II. The Hero
6
III. The Tragicomic Hero
9
IV. Masculinity
10
V. Environmental Undertones
13
VI. Sports
15
VII. Play
17
VIII. Survival
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IX. Obsession
19
X. Process, Intention and Product
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XI. Conclusion
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Works Cited
30
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“Endurance is more important than truth.”
-Henry Chinaski from the movie Barfly
I. Introduction
As a young man, I was captivated by stories of adventure. Growing up in northwest
Pennsylvania, I read the stories of Jack London, Ernest Hemingway, Robert Louis Stevenson and
John Steinbeck. I lived inside my head, creating my own adventures in the undeveloped woods
along the shores of Lake Erie. As I grew up, I became dissatisfied with the mundane prospects
that seemed my only options in Erie County. Travel, opportunity and challenge beckoned if I
could only take that first step away from there. Where were the adventures that I had read
about? I quit school and hit the road. I began to follow in the footsteps of another literary hero of
mine, Jack Kerouac. Traveling to most of the 50 states, I landed in Alaska and found my home. I
stayed. That is where my history as a professional artist begins.
I was enamored with the romance of Alaska and eager to experience what life had to
offer in the “Last Frontier.” Like an actor researching a role, I worked many of the jobs that
would create experiences I thought would become fodder for “Great American Art.” I worked in
an Alyeska Pipeline camp, as a commercial fisherman, on the Alaska Railroad and became a tree
cutter. I always felt like an art spy who would take the vernacular of the workingman and turn it
into literature. You could say I was a performer, not on stage, but in the real world.
When I look back on the choices that led me here, it all makes sense in terms of my
current work. Why would anyone wanting to become an artist move to Alaska? Out here on the
periphery, insulated from the art centers of the world by distance, climate and rugged terrain,
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there is not much of an art scene. It is difficult to survive here in every sense. My decision to
move to Alaska was imposing a voluntary resistance to hopefully achieve something greater.
When I began this academic program, I was making still photographs that illustrated
literary works. I created pictures that described short stories from writers that I admired, such as
Big Two Hearted River by Ernest Hemingway (fig. 2) and To Build a Fire by Jack London (fig.
1). I picked stories that dealt with notions of struggle, death and redemption. These stories have
the common theme of man-versus-himself and man-versus-environment. They are American
masterpieces and carry all of the weight and baggage of the literary canon. Upon entered the
MFA program, I planned on interpreting either Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad or working
with a Greek myth, like that of Prometheus. After the initial critiques of my work and ideas, I
thought it might be better to get out of that rut and play with something entirely new in terms of
content and medium. I chose to work in video and had to play around a lot to learn the craft. I
freed my mind and my art making practice and relied on instinct, starting to explore humor and
absurdity.
Fig. 1. Michael Conti, Newcomer, 2007
Fig 2. Michael Conti, Pumping Alive, 2007
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As I became more informed in the art and technique of filmmaking, I found more
possibilities of using the video camera to interpret myth and use of the Alaskan landscape as my
mise en scene. I shot my short video Balls of Ice in an afternoon and literally stumbled into my
thesis work using the metaphor of sports. It became one of my more successful videos and
opened the possibilities for more absurd video art using sports. I made Slapstick, then the Rink 1
and 2, then Icing the Puck and later condensed these shorts into my thesis work, presently called
Hockey Shorts. I loved the comedy of ideas these pieces presented, but struggled to find a
motive for this character I was creating. It was after I had made several films and much
introspection that I discovered what I was doing. I was depicting forms of heroic myths.
II. The Hero
The myth of the hero takes many forms and goes further back than the ancient Greeks.
Every culture has had its version of the hero, from Gilgamesh and Hercules, to George
Washington and Charles Lindbergh. Joseph Campbell has done extensive study on this subject,
his most popular book being The Hero With A Thousand Faces. Some myths are purely made
up, but others are created around real people through the telling and re-telling of their adventures
until their stories become more fiction than fact.
A myth with particular meaning to my videos is that of Sisyphus. He was the Greek Hero
who attempted to cheat death and was sentenced to roll a rock up a hill in Hades for eternity,
only to have it roll back down. I was consciously channeling Sisyphus when I shot the last scene
of my video Balls of Ice (fig. 3). The last scene (which was shot first and was the impetus of all
my sports related video) begins with a struggle to break a large chunk of sea ice free from the
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snow. I struggle with it, and then finally kick it free. Then begins the effort to pick it up.
It is slippery and I can’t get a grip on it.
Eventually I hoist it into position and carry it
off screen. As soon as I leave the scene, the
ball of ice fades back into the same position it
occupied before I arrived, implying that I
would have to repeat the task. In this action
Fig 3. Michael Conti, Balls of Ice, 2009
I meant to represent the repetition of our daily labors and that the glory of the action was not in
the result but in the act itself. Albert Camus interprets this myth in terms of the absurd hero who
“thus gives the recipe for the absurd victory” (p. 122). Camus states that the story of Sisyphus is
only a tragedy when he walks back down the hill to begin his task anew. During this walk, he is
conscious of his eternal work. While he is pushing the rock, his task is heroic in his grand
effort.
Nietzsche also writes about this concept, calling it the will to power. He writes, “Every
specific body strives to become master over all space and to extend its force (its will to power:)
and to thrust back all that resists its extension” (Nietzsche 480). Nietzsche’s motivation is not
the forceful domination of others, but the desire and will to overcome resistance toward the
betterment of oneself.
The concept of “will to power” is also represented in the tasks that Matthew Barney sets
for himself in his work. Guggenheim curator Nancy Spector shown on a video called Body as
Matrix states that “Barney’s epic hero’s journey, through tunnel or elevator shaft, is a heroic
game where a game has to be played, every obstacle has to be overcome. It’s a traditional
narrative, or motif” (Spector, Body as Matrix DVD).
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In parts of The Cremaster Cycle, Barney plays Harry Houdini. In Barney’s mythology,
Harry Houdini has become “he who had taken on resistance, he’d elect to self impose resistance
as a way to generate form”. Nancy Spector continues that Houdini is an alter ego of the artist
“that represents hermetic systems and the notion of transcendence through extreme discipline.
This is a motif that you see in Matthews work from the very beginning through the end of The
Cremaster Cycle”.
My work is constantly being drawn from the concept of resistance and endurance. This
same idea is pivotal in Matthew Barney’s early video work, specifically the Drawing Restraint
videos produced while he was in Yale art school in the late 80s and early 90s. Drawing
Restraint is a series of videotaped performance pieces where Barney attempts to make a drawing
despite a series of self-imposed obstructions. In one video, he must make the drawing high on
the wall while tethered to the floor (fig. 4). In another, he must jump on a trampoline to make a
mark on the ceiling. In a third, a rope with a weight resists his efforts to get close enough to the
paper to make a mark.
Fig. 4 Matthew Barney, Drawing Restraint 2, 1988
Fig. 5 Michael Conti, Hockey Shorts, 2009
Like Barney, I would position myself in a situation with an obstacle to overcome so that I
might then achieve a transcendent experience such as climbing a mountain to play hockey (fig.
5). The very act of putting on skates is a limitation. To use a stick to manipulate a puck rather
than just using one’s hand is a limitation. The ice itself is a limitation that becomes a medium
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with which to achieve something greater. The slickness of ice is a hazard that normally one must
avoid. However, with skates, that hazard is navigated in such a way that beauty and grace is
created. I love the idea of taking this to the extreme by playing hockey on broken up sea ice, on
a glacier or on top of a mountain. Barney is also an influence in his use of sports equipment such
as weight benches, climbing gear and racehorses as metaphors. In his Cremaster Cycle, Barney
delves further into body politics, sports and mythic heroism.
I do not believe my character is a classic hero of any sort. He has too much of the clown
in him. The character that I have created in my work explores a combination of both real and
fictional archetypes of the sports hero (Wayne Gretzky or Joe Montana), the wilderness man
(Daniel Boone, Jeremiah Johnson or Ernest Shackleton) and the fool (Buster Keaton or Don
Quixote). This combination of archetypal references informs my concept of The Tragicomic
Hero.
III. The Tragicomic Hero
Often cited as the first modern novel, The Ingenious Hidalgo Don Quixote of La Mancha
was written by the Spaniard Miguel de Cervantes and first published in 1605. The hero of the
novel Don Quixote’s quest in life is to revive knight-errantry in a world devoid of chivalric
virtues and values. He believes only what he chooses to believe and sees the world very
differently from most people. Honest, dignified, proud, and idealistic, he wants to save the world.
As intelligent as he is mad, Don Quixote starts out as an absurd and isolated figure and ends up
as a pitiable and lovable old man whose strength and wisdom have failed him.
Don Quixote’s adventures have become an archetype for the fool’s errand in our culture
(fig. 6). Unbeknownst to me when I began this project, I had been engaging the idea of the
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quixotic in my quest to raise the level of the game of outdoor hockey. In his extreme efforts to
play against the environment, up his game and experience a transcendent state, my character
faces himself laid bare. My character does not want to save the world; he wants to save himself.
The essence of story telling is conflict. The essence of comedy is failure. This failure
can come in many forms: frustration, miscommunication, sabotage, collisions both physical and
metaphysical or by just plain falling down. Like silent film era slapstick movies, my videos are
existential comedies based on the collisions of physics, intention and the rational.
While unconsciously following in the footsteps of Don Quixote in my videos, I was
consciously channeling the silent film comedian Buster Keaton. Keaton is the fool, naïve, honest
and empathetic (fig. 7). He is small of stature and the obvious underdog while pursuing his goals
in absolute earnestness against seemingly insurmountable odds.
Fig 6. Pablo Picasso, Don Quixote,1955
Fig. 7 Buster Keaton, Our Hospitality, 1923
IV. Masculinity
It is always interesting to me how an audience will read a work of art. They must bring
themselves to the work to complete the meaning of the art. I believe that any reading of my
work is a correct one, based on who the audience is and what their point of view might be. I like
the idea that the work becomes an empty vessel in which the viewers pour themselves. While
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showing this work in Boston to an audience well versed in postmodern thought, notions of
gender theory and masculinity kept being raised. My intended meaning in the work was not
based on the performance of gender, however, I feel I must address the issue in this paper.
Theorist Judith Butler writes that our ideas of gender identity are all performance based;
all notions of our masculinity or femininity are fabricated. In Gender Trouble, she postulates,
“as in other ritual social dramas, the action of gender requires a performance that is repeated.
This repetition is at once a reenactment and re-experiencing of a set of meanings already socially
established; and it is the mundane and ritualized form of their legitimation” (Butler 140). This is
to say that we learn how to act like men and women. It is up for debate whether this
performance is dominantly based from feelings within us or learned behavior taught by our
culture; it is probably a mixture of both. It harkens back to the old question of nature versus
nurture. Either way, our gender is a performance that we generate and adapt to navigate through
culture throughout our lifetime.
Being a man in contemporary society is more complex after the ideas and critical theory
generated from various waves of feminism of the 70s, 80s and 90s. The male role has changed.
In traditional mythology, the measure of a man is how many goals he scored, how many women
he has been with, how many men he has bested and how much money he has. In the book Male
Myths and Icons, Roger Horrocks writes:
Are there cracks in the façade of patriarchy, or huge splits? The realization of the
shaky foundation on which our male identity rests is of a great moment in the study of
masculinities, since patriarchal capitalism has needed the masculine gender as one of its
main buttresses. Therefore cracks or splits in traditional ‘virile’ masculinity, and
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representations of it, may well indicate at least a weakening, and possibly a
disintegration, in patriarchy and capitalism themselves” (p. 28).
In his 5-film series entitled The Cremaster Cycle, Matthew Barney explores a number of
gender-based myths that are related to my character’s performance. The thread that ties the
entire series together is the idea of the Cremaster muscle1 and the differentiation of the male and
the female embryo and the point at which the gonads rise to become ovaries or fall to become
testicles. In many of his works, Barney uses images, text or ideas of gender in relation to objects
or images of traditionally male-oriented sports. Barney plays characters based on historical
figures that really existed, such as escape artist Harry Houdini and convicted murderer Gary
Gilmore, as well as imagined mythic characters such as the Entered Apprentice, The Loughton
Candidate, a giant, a magician and a diva. Barney’s changing persona in his films fluctuates
from the masculine to gender-neutral to feminine (fig. 8).
Entered Apprentice
Loughton Candidate
Gary Gilmore
Entered Apprentice
a Giant
Fig 8. Matthew Barney as a variety of characters from the Cremaster Cycle, 1994 – 2002
As a character’s costume is a part of the act, clothes are also part of the performance of
being a man. As Friedrich Weltzien says in his article Masque-ulinities: Changing Dress as a
Display of Masculinity in the Superhero Genre, “the superhero comic book presents a wellknown example of the construction of masculinity through the use of different costumes” (p.
1
The cremaster muscle controls the testicular contractions in response to external stimuli such as temperature or
internal stimuli such as fear.
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229). In several parts of my video Hockey Shorts, particular cinematic attention is paid to getting
dressed up into hockey gear. It is a dividing line between two parts of the tragicomic hero
character that I play, the turning point between that of the earnest adventurer and the absurdist
clown. When I put on the costume of the hockey player in the wilderness, the audience might
wonder about the intentions as well as the mental stability of the character. As Weltzien says
“This complete incompatibility of the two characters is analogous to clowning; the clown
behaves in a manner obviously different from the way the actor would behave without the
clown’s mask and costume” (Weltzien 231). While the uniform can be read as the clown’s
costume, the helmet, the pads and the guards that the athletes wear approximate the armor of the
knights, the samurai and the fighting men of old. The armor becomes a signifier of the
masculine man, a man of conflict and conquest.
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V. Environmental Undertones
Another theme that I had not anticipated began to develop through the feedback of the
viewers. My audience kept being drawn to ideas about global warming and climate change. It
was not my original intention to comment on this issue, though I feel strongly that it should be
addressed in our society. Through this media-influenced reading, the work began to take on a
In the essay, The Televised Sports Manhood Formula, author Michael Messner states, “What is a Real Man? A
Real Man is strong, tough, aggressive, and above all, a winner in what is still a Man’s World. To be a winner he has
to do what needs to be done. He must be willing to compromise his own long-term health by showing guys in the
face of danger, by fighting other men when necessary, and by ‘playing hurt’ when he’s injured. He must avoid
being soft; he must be the aggressor, both on the ‘battle fields’ of sports and in his consumption choices. Whether
he is playing sports or making choices about which snack food or auto products to purchase, his aggressiveness will
net him the ultimate prize: the adoring attention of conventionally beautiful women. He will know if and when he
has arrived as a Real Man when the Voices of Authority – white males – say he is a real Man. But even when he has
finally managed to win the big one, has the good car, the right beer, and is surrounded by beautiful women, he will
be reminded by these very same Voices of Authority just how fragile this Real Manhood really is: After all, he has
to come out and prove himself all over again tomorrow. You’re only as good as your last game (or your last
purchase).” (Messner 151)
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life of its own. I found that it informed my subsequent pieces and began to work its way into the
intention of the video (fig. 9).
Ice hockey is the perfect vehicle to invoke the idea of global warming. Ice hockey
requires a balance between cold and heat. The rink requires cold to maintain a skating surface.
The activity generates heat. In physics, the First Law of Thermodynamics3 says that energy
cannot be created or destroyed, it can only change forms within a closed system. Simply put, the
hockey player must produce energy in order to move. Kinetic energy is transformed into thermal
energy by the friction of the player’s blades rubbing against the ice. The heat melts the ice into a
thin layer of water, which in turn reduces the friction between the blade and the ice, allowing the
skater to glide. A small amount of energy is given up in the form of heat creating a greater glide
and better experience for the skater. The Boston artist Jane Marsching’s work, such as Arctic
Listening Post (fig. 10), has influenced my work with respect to climate change. I appreciate
how she employs a humorous, absurdist, almost melodramatic approach to a very serious subject.
Both Marsching’s and my work becomes symbolic of human energy use on this planet.
Fig. 9 Michael Conti, Hockey Shorts, 2009
Fig. 10. Jane Marcshing, Arctic Listening Post 2009
Also know as the Law of Conservation of Energy. First described by Germain Hess via Hess’s law, the law of
conservation of energy is an empirical law of physics. It states that the total amount of energy in an isolated system
remains constant over time (is said to be conserved over time). A consequence of this law is that energy can neither
be created nor destroyed; it can only be transformed from one state to another. The only thing that can happen to
energy in a closed system is that it can change form, for instance chemical energy can become kinetic energy
(Wikipedia).
3
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VI. Sports
Most of my recent video work is centered on the game of ice hockey. Hockey has
become a metaphor for those contradictions I find within myself and my experiences within our
society.
The concept of ice hockey is simple, the object is to take a stick and try to put a puck into
a goal,4 but there are many dualities to hockey that I find fascinating and absurd. It is a very fast,
flowing game that is at the same time sweaty, stinky and brutal. The game gets faster and more
fluid in its finer moments; it is awkward and artless at its worst. There is an element of slapstick
comedy to the sport. The presence of ice increases the occurrence of pratfalls; it exaggerates both
the finesse and the awkwardness of the player. I find the comedy and tragedy, the grace and
violence of hockey incredibly interesting. It moves very fast, and is therefore a hard sport to
photograph, but the images are beautiful if you catch the moment (fig. 13).
The gear that the player must have is extensive. The players have a weapon in hand (the
hockey stick) and blades on their feet (ice skates). Their padding underneath the jersey is body
armor. They wear a helmet, shoulder pads, shin guards with extra large socks and ridiculous
oversized padded shorts with thick suspenders called “breezers”. Players are abnormally tall
because of the height of the skates they are wearing. They display their colors on their jerseys
like knights. The hockey rink is like the gladiator’s arena. Taken out of the context of the game,
the player becomes a silly warrior in a violent ballet. They look especially awkward when
walking off the ice or when fighting. Fistfights have become part of the game. All hockey teams
have a player who takes on the unofficial role of the Enforcer, also known as the Tough Guy.
The Enforcer is the player that will stand up for some of the smaller and more skilled players
4
The Mi’kmaq First Nation peoples of Eastern Canada are credited with the invention of a hockey-like game. They
played a game similar to field hockey, but also took it to the ice. (Ice Hockey, Britannica)
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when those players are unfairly roughed up by the opposition. There is a code of honor to this
ritualistic display of violence and retribution. The players drop their gloves and sometimes take
off their helmets, hold onto the opponent’s jersey to keep from falling down on the ice while
trading punches. They will try to pull the opponents jersey over their head, pinning their arms
and furthering the comic aspect. The referees usually circle the pugilistic duo and let them battle
it out before sending one or both to the penalty box. The fans love it. They cheer and throw
frozen fish onto the ice. Everyone’s blood is up at this gladiatorial display. Aside from the
hand-to-hand combat sports (boxing, judo, and so forth), hockey is the only sport that allows
fighting.
It is significant to me that there is a National Hockey League team called the Penguins
(fig. 11).5 The hockey player and the penguin have similar attributes. The penguin is a flightless
bird that lives on the ice and feeds in the waters of Antarctica. The penguin is very clumsy
looking as it waddles around on land on its stubby legs and rotund body. As soon as the penguin
dives into the water, it swims as beautifully as the bird flies; dodging, twisting and soaring
through the water in pursuit of a meal. Like a penguin out of water, the hockey player is
awkward off the ice. They clunk around on rubber-matted floors to protect their blades,
waddling side to side with their heavy padding. Once on the ice, the player swirls and glides
like a penguin swims. The player must be moving to be stable, carving on the edge of the blades.
The movement is elegant. Like the Golden Mean, it approaches geometric perfection (fig. 12).
5
Based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the Penguins got their name for the shape of the arena that they played in,
which was called “the Igloo”. The Penguins made their NHL debut in 1967, and have won three Stanley Cups, most
recently in 2009.
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Fig. 11 Penguins logo
Fig. 12. The golden mean
Fig 13. Penguins at play, 2009
There is also the absurdity of creating ice indoors. In order to play the game in warm
climates, or cold climates out of season, one must create indoor ice. This ice is more controlled
and consistent, smoother and marked with red and blue lines and circles. The very idea of
creating indoor ice is antithetical to the idea of human dwellings. Ordinarily, people try to keep
the ice out of their houses. In hockey, they go to great lengths to put the most perfect ice back
into the structure. Hockey is naturally a cold climate sport; I find it hard to fathom how people
in warm climates relate to the game. Why would the Minnesota North Stars move to Dallas?
Who would watch the Kings play in Los Angeles, CA or the Lightening in Tampa Bay, FL?
VII. Play
Everyone learns through playing: children, athletes, artists. “The great archetypal
activities of human society are all permeated with play from the start” (Huizinga 4). Play is
integral to learning about oneself and the world around and is the first step in the process of
discovery. When an athlete plays in a game, he or she learns more about the game and most
importantly, more about themselves. The game is the vehicle, the framework or pathway in
which one discovers one’s strengths, weaknesses, style and skills. Through play one discovers
oneself.
This idea translates to all walks of life, but most importantly to creativity and the arts.
Creativity is essentially playing. One never knows where one is going when creating art. It is a
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journey where the destination is unknown. Through my work I am visualizing the link between
play and the creative process through the relationship between art and sports.
VIII. Survival
Play is necessary for survival as well. If one lives in a cold climate there is not much else
to do for diversion all winter long. Hockey staves off cabin fever and becomes a technique for
survival. Staying indoors for eight months of winter leads to a type of insanity commonly known
as “cabin fever”. A great example of this would be the story of the polar explorer Ernest
Shackleton and his crew when their ship was frozen in the Ross sea ice during the Antarctic
winter of 1915 (fig. 14). To keep their morale up and energy level high, the explorers would
stage plays, show lanternslides, hold dog sled races or compete in other sports. It was necessary
to keep the men from boredom, insanity and hostility against their shipmates. Play is essential to
survival, and when the weather is dark and cold, humans must work harder to play.
My videos come from a dark place, literally and
metaphorically. In a literal sense, winter in the
north is cold and dark. From the metaphorical
point of view, I am playing hockey in the absurd
landscape to keep at bay the possibility of
Fig 14. Frank Hurley, Shackleton’s Endurance
depression that looms over my doorstep.
frozen in the Antarctic sea ice, 1915
IX. Obsession
The obsession of the sports fan is fascinating to me. I consider myself a marginal sports
fan at best. What I do enjoy about sporting events is the spectacle and the drama of the game.
Most sports fans are the type of people willing to blindly follow a team or an idea that has
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absolutely no concrete effect on their life or survival. They manifest a particular kind of
insanity, akin to blind faith, that is contradictory and ripe with drama. The Oxford Dictionary
defines the term “Fan” as short for fanatic (fig. 16). I fully appreciate this quality of fanaticism
and obsession (fig. 15). I do not understand the mob mentality, yet I am drawn to the idea of it.
Like a decree from a higher power, sports fans seem to rely on superstition and ritual for success.
They often choose their loyalties based on the arbitrary logic of geographic proximity. Whatever
team lives closest to them is their team6. I believe this to be related to the primeval notion of the
tribe. We talk about peace on Earth, but the reality is, we thrive on conflict. Humans may never
move beyond the “us versus them” way of life. Sports and fandom are just a way of playing out
tribal warfare in a somewhat safe and controlled environment.
Fig 15 Michael Conti, Hockey Shorts, 2009
Fig 16. Sports Fans, 2010
To be a sports fan is to be a performer. The performance is directed towards gaining
acceptance and status within the group. The fans cheer for their team. They shout advice to
unhearing ears. They chant, sing and employ random, annoying noisemakers like the cowbell.
They traffic in obvious slogans, like “Go Team!” “Defense!” or “Shoot!” They berate the
athletes when they do not perform to expectation. They screams insults and slurs at their
6
The concept of BIRG, which stands for Basking In Reflected Glory, is a theory that describes the obsessive
behavior of the sports fan. Wikipedia describes this social psychological phenomena as self-esteem building by
identification with another person’s success by basking in reflected glory not earned (Cialdini).
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opponents. They scream at their televisions sets, radios or other inanimate objects of
communication. They defy logic.
This unreasoning, irrational obsession is present to some degree in most humans, and
most eloquently described by Werner Herzog. The overarching theme and form of his films are
narratives of obsession sans logic. The subjects that he has chosen, the characters whose stories
he tells, are all obsessive, unrelenting and often self-destructive. The story of Timothy
Treadwell, the Grizzly Man is one such example. Treadwell’s story is about a man who finds
redemption and healing in the natural world of the brown bears of the Alaska Peninsula. He
becomes obsessed with the bears and eventually is killed by one.
The lead actor in several of Herzog’s films, Klaus Kinski, is an obsessive, maniacal
figure. Herzog reveals their famously turbulent relationship in the documentary My Best Fiend.
Two films starring Kinski, Aguirre, Wrath of God and Fitzcarraldo, explore both the good and
evil side of obsession. As Aguirre, Kinski is obsessed with wealth, power and the conquest of
the Amazon Jungle in the day of Pizarro and the Incan empire. As Fitzcarraldo (fig. 17), he is
obsessed with opera and realizing his dream of building a world-class opera house in the
Amazon Jungle. One of the impossible tasks he must perform to see his dream realized is to
have his steam ship hauled over a mountain.
Fig. 17 Werner Herzog, Fitzcarraldo, 1982
Fig. 18 Michael Conti, Hockey Shorts, 2009
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Paul Pfeiffer is an artist that inspires me in undermining the glory and hero worship of
sports stars and triumphant symbolism of the trophies. Pfeiffer digitally alters images and
footage appropriated from Sports Illustrated or ESPN to shift focus from the players and onto the
context in which we perceive them. In the video piece Caryatid (fig. 19), Pfeiffer appropriates
and alters footage from various NHL videos of the Stanley Cup celebrations where the players
hoist the cup over their heads, skate around the ice and pass it to each other. He meticulously
erases the players from the video, frame by frame, until it appears that the Stanley Cup hovers
around the rink on its own. The artist forces us to look at our award systems in a strange new
way. In this video, the revered trophy becomes a fetish object, something sacred and mystical.
Fig. 19 Paul Pfeiffer, Caraytid, 2004
Fig. 20. Michael Conti, Hockey Shorts, 2009
X. Process, Intention and Product
In my video work, I am drawing from and tapping into all of these ideas that I find so
succinctly represented in the game of ice hockey. I look around me during the wintertime. What
have I to work with? Mountains, frozen rivers, snow and ice surround me. I am enthralled by
the Alaskan landscape; it is why I am here. I begin to play in the landscape. Theorist Richard
Schechner describes performance art as “twice behaved behavior” (Sweeny 140). I feel am
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working in the autobiographical tradition as some of the pioneering performance artists of film
and video in the late sixties and early seventies.
Vito Acconci was a poet that turned to video and performance art in the 1960s. In some
of his seminal pieces, he talks to the camera (the viewer), pleads with it, seduces it, acts out in
front of it (fig. 21). I find his process intriguing, as well as his concepts. He is play acting and
improvising around a theme. There is a feeling of intuitive action and improvisation to these
pieces. I do not believe that he knows or wants to know entirely what he is doing when he
makes a video. I think that he does a lot of his thinking on an unconscious level. Acconci
predominantly used interior spaces and speech to convey his ideas. His work is very intimate in
dealing with personal space and boundaries, while my work deals with symbolic gestures and
relationship of self to environment. Like Acconci, I improvise my performances in the
landscape.
Fig. 21 Vito Acconci, Theme Song, 1973
Fig. 22 Michael Conti, Hockey Shorts, 2009
My videos utilize humor and irony to subvert the idea of the sports hero. Instead of
classic posing and demonstrations of skill and strength, my character contorts his body to merely
remain upright on rough terrain. Playing with scale, he uses oversized or undersized equipment.
When he falls, he springs back on his skates with determination in the face of certain failure.
I also have been inspired by the life and work of Dutch artist Bas Jan Ader. He
performed in a series of short 16mm art films in the 1970’s. The films were centered on an
23
absurd action that included falling off of a roof, falling from a tree or riding a bicycle into a canal
(fig. 23). While this subject matter may seem mundane, it was symbolic to Ader of one’s falls in
life. If the classical ideal of art is a kind of elevation, lifting up or spiritualization, one way of
characterizing the art of Ader is as an "art of the fall." Rather than the miraculous flight of the
genius, its iconic figure is the well-timed tumble of the slapstick artist: Buster Keaton in place of
Picasso. Ader’s conviction in his work was validated after he was lost at sea while trying to sail
a small boat from America back to the Netherlands as a performance piece called In Search of
the Miraculous. Like the Ader films, the hockey player in my videos seems oblivious of danger
in the single-minded pursuit of his goal (fig. 24). There is no triumph in the end, and the question
remains: did the player complete his task?
Fig. 23 Bas Jan Ader, Fall 2, 1971
Fig. 24 Michael Conti, Hockey Shorts, 2009
The work is meant to be humorous, but at the same time, I want the audience to feel
uncomfortable. In the face of all that futility and absurdity, the player’s earnestness seems
unnaturally uncompromised. That anyone could continue to play and be playful under
those circumstances draws discomfort from the viewer as well as a strange feeling of
schadenfreude7.
7
Delight in the misfortune of others.
24
The process of play has led me to this theme of sports performed in a manner that does
not make sense. Though I have stage fright in front of a live audience, I found that I could
comfortably perform alone in front of the camera. I could act and communicate with an
audience without actually being in the room with them and speak from the video space rather
than the audience’s space. I wanted to act out abstract feelings in the video such as futility,
obsession, and repetition (fig. 26). A team sport played earnestly in total isolation is absurdity
itself.
Bruce Nauman’s process with his early film and video pieces arose from a simple desire
to see what his body could do in the space of his studio (Video Data Bank, Nauman). He started
out as a sculptor, but when he turned to film, he was still dealing with the body in space (fig. 25).
His body became the sculpture and the screen (the filmic world) was the space.
Fig 25. Bruce Nauman, Walking in an exaggerated
Manner around the Perimeter of a Square, 1969.
Fig. 26 Michael Conti, Balls of Ice, 2009
Like Nauman, I wanted to see what my body could do in space. I want to see what I
could get away with and where I could go on ice skates. Inspired by other extreme, hybrid or
ridiculous sports, I attempted to perform ice hockey in the Alaskan landscape. I want to put
myself in a precarious situation to see if I could get out. Through the dangerous situation, I
would test myself and through the test, achieve something greater.
25
Nauman also deals with notions of what it means to be an artist. In his 1967 piece
entitled Window or Wall Sign, better known as the spiral shaped neon tubing piece which reads
“the true artist helps the world by revealing mystic truths”, Nauman expresses in an ironic way
his sense of the failure of the expectations of a “great artist”. His 1966 piece Failing to
Levitate in the Studio (fig. 27) also touches on similar territory.
Fig. 27 Bruce Nauman, Failing to Levitate in the Studio,1966
Fig. 28. Michael Conti, Hockey Shorts 2009
Much of my work addresses the same sort futility in life’s endeavors such as love,
ambition and the artistic process (fig. 28). The ending of my movies are not triumphant. I have
a set of rules that I employ when exploring an idea related to the ice hockey series.
I have broken down my process into a list:
1. Introduce a situation – I utilize the Alaska landscape, filled with rugged terrain, cold
rivers, remote glaciers, extreme cold winters and impenetrable wilderness. My use of the
sublime landscape is reminiscent of the Hollywood westerns of John Ford and the landscape
paintings of Casper David Friedrich. Choices of landscape situations that I have used are broken
up sea ice, a mountain, a summertime lake and a glacier.
2. Introduce a goal - The goal is to play ice hockey on absurd landscape situation. This
goal does not make sense. The mark of the conventional hero is to do what is required at exactly
the right time. The traditional hero’s motivation might be to conquer the wilderness and score
26
the goal. To save the day, the hero must act or react swiftly and without hesitation. In the
tragicomic situation, the hero acts in a nonsensical manner. The tragicomic hero’s goal is
questionable. Is it to merely survive the experience? Does he expect some elevated spiritual
state from this confrontation with the environment? In the very nature of absurdity, the
limitations of success become obvious. The viewer asks, what is the purpose of this action?
To play hockey on broken, uneven, dirty ice in danger of breaking through or falling in cracks
and drowning. To bring ice to mountaintop on hot summer day; play hockey on peak in danger
of falling on ascent or decent; play against time as the ice melts. To bring ice to lake on hot
summer day; float ice in lake; play hockey in danger of being stuck in muck or drowning; play
against time as the ice melts. To play hockey on uneven, rocky, dirty, melting glacier surface in
danger of breaking leg on crunchy ice or falling in crevasse.
3. Overcome Resistance - By succeeding in his goal, my tragicomic hero completes his
task, but to what end? The viewer is left to ponder the possibilities connecting the apparent
futility of the Hero’s actions with the payoff, which is never shown. My character attains a more
heightened experience, much greater triumph than flat ice hockey. As the artist I create images
more interesting, humorous and sad. The actions become symbolic of struggle, obstruction,
resistance, absurdity, futility. Though failure is assured, the victory is in the attempt.
By twisting the physical rules of hockey, new rules are created. Simple devices of
opposition and contrariness are employed. Hockey ice should be cold, flat, smooth and large
enough to skate on and pass a puck. I play on broken, dirty, steeply angled ice. Water should be
frozen in the form of ice. I play chest deep in a lake in the summer. I carry my own ice in with a
cooler and play until the ice melts in the water. Field of play should be fairly accessible. I bring
miniature ice rink to a mountaintop to play on. Ice should be stationary. I play on a glacier, a
27
moving river of ice that is rugged and full of rocks and dirt carved out from bedrock. Within
these collisions of context, I play against the inevitable. The ice is going to melt; the unspoken
symbolism saying that we are all going to die someday.
XI. Conclusion
Exploring and struggling through the art making process, weathering the intense
critiques, all the while researching and writing about art, I have learned much about the creative
process. One of the best lessons that my graduate school experience has taught me is how to
leave myself open to creativity. Many have said that creativity cannot be taught, but I say it can
be learned. It is something that happens inside of us, and each of us must find our own path to it.
My own art making process begins with the element of play. If I am loose and having fun with
my work, then it shows in the end product. If I am tight and forcing an idea, that shows in the
work as well.
The actor Phillip Seymour Hoffman was interviewed on the NPR program “Fresh Air
with Terry Gross”, which aired December 10, 2008. He talked about his love of sports. He
could not understand actors that were not sports fans because to him, sports and the dramatic arts
are two sides of the same coin. This thought sticks with me through the course of my work. I
believe ice hockey, and sports in general to be a great metaphor for the struggle of living. The
aspects of the human condition that I am most interested in are one’s conflicts within oneself and
with one’s environment. I would like to continue exploring the futility, the absurdity, the
repetition and the possibility of redemption in these acts.
In the near future I plan to write a short film based on the story of Don Quixote set in
Alaska. Don’s motive of reviving knight errantry in a world devoid of chivalry reminds me a lot
28
of homesteaders and romantics that come to Alaska pursuing what they perceive as a simple yet
romantic life carving a place for themselves out of the wilderness. It is the American Dream. I
know this motivation well, because I was one of them. We came to the north with many
preconceptions based on Jack London stories or movies such as Into the Wild and North to
Alaska. Long time Alaskans called “Sourdoughs”,8 dubbed the newcomers “Cheechakos.”9 Don
Quixote’s character could be interpreted beautifully by the contemporary concept of the
Cheechako.
The American tradition of pushing westward is described and often justified by colonists
in the concept of Manifest Destiny10. Looking backward, I would say is was a lot of misguided
thought that fueled this idea. It was devastating to the Native American’s way of life as well as
damaging to the environment of the West. The progression and single-minded pursuit of
freedom and prosperity has come at a great expense. I wouldn’t want to preach or try to instruct,
rather make a film of one fool’s personal quest of delusion. If done right, it might stand for the
folly of Manifest Destiny and the hubris of white man’s ambition. I think this material would
make for an excellent script with the potential of humor and sadness, another Tragicomic Hero
tale.
8
Sourdoughs are named after the type of bread that prospectors baked during the Gold Rush era of 1898.
Sourdough bread is rye based and uses lactobaccilis culture for leavening, which is much heartier in adverse
climates than wheat-based, yeast-leavened bread (Wikipedia).
9
A Cheechako is a slang term applied to newcomers to the northern country. One story of origin says that a native
man once asked a newly arrived gold prospector where he was from. The prospector replied “Chicago”, and the
native man’s pronunciation sounded like “Cheechako”. Synonyms: greenhorn, tenderfoot. (Wikipedia)
10
Manifest Destiny was the 19th century belief that the United States was destined to expand across the North
American continent, from the Atlantic seaboard to the Pacific Ocean. (Wikipedia)
29
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