Introducing Phenomenology & John Bock - The Absurd,Playful,Surreal, Grotesque

1. What is Phenomenology?

Phenomenology is commonly understood in either of two ways: as a disciplinary field in philosophy, or as a movement in the history of philosophy.

The discipline of phenomenology may be defined initially as the study of structures of experience, or consciousness. Literally, phenomenology is the study of "phenomena": appearances of things, or things as they appear in our experience, or the ways we experience things, thus the meanings things have in our experience. Phenomenology studies conscious experience as experienced from the subjective or first person point of view. This field of philosophy is then to be distinguished from, and related to, the other main fields of philosophy: ontology (the study of being or what is), epistemology (the study of knowledge), logic (the study of valid reasoning), ethics (the study of right and wrong action), etc.






John Bock is primarily known for his spectacular, comic-grotesque actions in which theater, lecture, video, installation, and sculpture merge in a unique way. In recent years video as a medium has moved to the foreground and become independent of the lecture-performances.


From video shorts with rapid montage, Bock has recently moved to distinctly longer and more narrative films in which he works with actors and real sets, which he then infiltrates with his own universe. As in his live performances, here too he celebrates a colorful world that is as enigmatic as it is absurd and that eludes rational interpretation, interspersed with countless biographical, artistic, and scientific references

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inspired by?
‘yes, my interest were in conceptual art first,
donald judd, etc. but then, yes, oskar schwemmer and the bauhaus theatre,happenings, yves klein’s performances, viennese activists,
fluxus,...’john bock said.



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john bock
was born in gribbohm in 1965.
he studied in hamburg, he lives and works in berlin.

he has had solo exhibitions in a number of international institutions
including MoMA, new york, usa;
kunstwerke, berlin, germany;
kunsthalle basel, switzerland;
secession, wien, austria;
institute of contemporary art, london.

john Bock's installations, videos and performances have been
exhibited in some of the most prestigious group exhibitions and biennials worldwide including two editions of the venice biennale; italy manifesta 5, san sebastian, spain;yokohama triennial, japan; and documenta 11, kassel, germany.