My own view of the work of art is perhaps a bit too static. My paradigm work of art is the painting. Now, of course we agree with Dufrenne that "the work must present itself to perception"(19). The various art forms have their different ways of presentation. For Dufrenne, I think the presentation is key to the being of the work of art. In addition, the paradigm of presentation is performance.

For this reason we may think of performing arts as more easily understood in their nature as works of art.  A play is created as writing, a text.  But the performance is where the play takes on its being as a work of art.  There is some debate about this in some cases.  I think there are some Shakespeare plays that are better read than performed.  (Well, I don’t think this, but maybe I have heard that said about some of the plays.  When the poetry becomes too complex perhaps.) So there is a performance associated with the work of art.  The work of art must put on a show for us.  Attract our perceiving attention. 

Attract us in such a way that we perceive it appropriately as a work of art, and then give rise to an aesthetic object.  It is interesting, because usually when we think of performance, we think of a performer.  Someone instantiating a piece of music, or acting a part in a play. Dufrenne also recognizes this as a kind of performance.  There are, for him, arts in which “the performer is not the creator"(20).  In such cases we have a set of instructions given by the creator to guide the actions of the performer.  Where exactly is the work of art in all this?  We want to let that go.  We assumed at the beginning that we have a work of art.  We have a score to the symphony.  We are asking for an honest performance so that the score can produce a work of art.  But of course the performance must be honest, in a way.  It must faithfully produce the work of art as intended.  Musicians have their scores (or at least their lead sheets).  The theater actor has his script (provided by the “artist"), but also his director, and stage manager, etc.  The screen actor even more, has so much in addition to the script, it is difficult to know where the work of art ends and the performance begins.  Somewhere we have the performance that presents the work of art.  Something interesting here with respect to dance, and choreography.  There is often enough no written text to guide the dance.  There is instruction, something like “do it this way” and a demonstration.  Yet we separate the choreographer from the dancer.  In the world of musical performance we have the performance of a scored piece, Verdi’s La
Traviata has its score that must be respected.  The performers are performing that piece.  It can be instantiated in many different ways.  There is some sense in which Bernstein/Sondheim is really just Romeo and Juliet, and Shakespeare gives rise to many different honest and aesthetically respectable performances.  There is also music that does not live in the score.  There is some techno style music that seems to live in the performance.  There is no chance that anyone else later will “play that piece” because there is no piece to play. 

In the world of jazz there is often improvisation.  Such improvisations can live just in the performance, but it often happens that transcribers come along later and, on the basis of recordings, make a score out of what originally was a performed piece of art.  In such cases the performer is the creator, and the scribe is the helper.  It can be not so obvious a line.  Many themes in Duke Ellington’s compositions began as improvised lines by his musicians.  Many musicians improvise the same lines each time they play a particular work.I want to return to this idea of the performance of the work. 

Dufrenne considers the “arts in which the performer is the creator”, and he places painting and sculpture in this category.  “The painter executes or “performs” a portrait, the sculptor a bust"(30).  I’m not sure I like this idea of where the performance lies in these arts.  It seems to me more in line with what Dufrenne is suggesting to say that every experience of a work of art requires a contemporary performance in order to give rise to an aesthetic experience.  That is what I want to say, anyway.  I am going to leave it here, though, and return to this theme throughout this commentary. 

Kandinsky’s wife said that her habit was to rush through museums until something caught her eye and made her stop.  What makes her, or anyone, stop is an appropriate aesthetic performance.  A painting can perform as well as an actor on a stage, or a violinist in a concert hall.  Let’s try to work that out.