I found this week’s reading to be extremely interesting. The main concept that stuck out to me and that I admire is John Cage's “itch to try new things.” I really love the four minutes and thirty-three seconds of silence because of how involved the audience becomes with the piece. I think that it is super ironic and fascinating that the absence of sound in John Cage’s performance brings more out of the audience than if he played music. In my eyes, the audience becomes the art when David Tudor goes on stage and is silent for nearly 5 minutes.
While this piece was powerful when it came out in 1952, I think it would be even more interesting if it was performed today. Due to social media, advertising, and algorithms, our attention spans have gone way down in the 70 years since the original performance of 4’33”. I think it would be really interesting to see how an audience would react or to see if they would even be able to handle four minutes and thirty-three seconds of silence nowadays. I will honestly say that this period of silence would not be a walk in the park for me and I am sure many other people would have the same reactions.
I have always loved art that pushes boundaries and makes people uncomfortable for good reason.
I really loved reading about John Cage’s story and how his work “split open the musical scene of the mid-twentieth century.” His exploration allowed for countless other people to push the boundaries of art and I think he deserves more recognition.
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