How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy

by Jenny Odell

At the start of Cage Piece, Hsieh had a lawyer visit the cage at the beginning to witness it being sealed shut and return at the end to confirm that the seal had not been broken. In an essay on Hsieh, arts writer Carol Becker notes the irony of appealing to the law “even though the law that governs Hsieh’s work is a rigorous system of his own invention.”25 She compares him to an athlete—a high jumper or a pole-vaulter who impresses the viewer with his training and “mastery of self.” Indeed, Hsieh is an artist known for his discipline. After Cage Piece, he continued making pieces that each lasted a year: Time Clock Piece, in which he punched a time clock every hour on the hour; Outdoor Piece, in which he wouldn’t allow himself to go inside (including cars and trains); Rope Piece, in which he was tied to the artist Linda Montano (they had to stay in the same room but could not touch each other); and No Art Piece, in which he didn’t make, look at, read about, or talk about art. In a 2012 interview, Hsieh says that he is not an endurance artist, yet he also says that the most important word to him is “will.”