Performed at the 1962 Fluxus Festspiele neuester Musik in Wiesbaden, Zen for Head by Nam June Paik (1992–2006) is an interpretation of La Monte Young’s Composition #10 1960 to Bob Morris. In executing Young’s instruction to “draw a straight line and follow it,” Paik dipped his own head, hands, and tie in a bowl of ink and tomato juice and drew a line by dragging his head along a narrow piece of paper laid out on the floor. The result was Zen for Head, a work that connected art and life, and Paik’s radical reaction to East Asian calligraphy. His gesture also rendered Young’s open work autographic—“signed” by Paik’s head. This “authorization” must have surprised Young, who later said, “I always understood it was my piece.” The generally open status of works of art in Fluxus created the paradox of answering one composition with another and challenged the notion of authorship: “Paik’s gesture does not, cannot function as an index of the master’s hand,” according to David Doris; “rather [it is] the index of any body, any performer who chooses to enact the work” (Doris, 1998). The multiple interpretations of this work reflect the prolific instability of Zen for Film and pose difficult questions as to how—and by whom—artworks might be. —AG

Image: Goettert/picture-alliance/dpa/AP Images.