ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author discusses three examples of experimentation with art and ethnography. Two of the author examples are works by artists Juan Downey and Sharon Lockhart and one is by an anthropologist Michael Oppitz. To the author knowledge, Downey's and Lockhart's work have not been considered by anthropologists, and the anthropological side of their work does not receive central treatment by art writers. In this chapter, the author have shown three modes of experimentation with ethnography and art, all of which have different implications for the ways in which anthropology and contemporary art define their relationship, appropriate from each other, and might develop future collaborations. If Oppitz resolutely opposes staging of events, Lockhart's Teatro Amazonas seems to be the ultimate example of artifice, with the staging of a cross-section of the population of Manaus watching a musical performance in an opera house.
