Is that how the upper middle class operates today?
YVONNE: Yes, the upper middle class is still infatuated with art. In the ’80s and ’90s, the nouveau riche collected a lot of art. It went hand in hand with a vast increase in wealth within a very small portion of the population. I sensed these correspondences when I began to investigate turn of the century Vienna, but they became much clearer afterwards. With the new installation, I’m doing a very strange thing. I’m attacking the cultural elite, and yet I’m also setting myself up as a product of this haute-bourgeoisie fascination which indeed the dance has always been. The rehearsals that I videotaped took place under very luxurious circumstances at the White Oak plantation in Florida, which is the seven thousand acre estate of the paper magnate who is Baryshnikov’s patron. My work was made under the auspices of that opulence. TIM: What makes you want to go back into gallery installation? YVONNE: It isn’t a matter of going back. I’ve never really been in, right? I came out of movemen
