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This weekend I had the honor of experiencing Tino Sehgal's Kiss. It was quite possibly the single most powerful work of art I have ever experienced. Kiss is currently on exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Arts in Chicago until the end of the year. What is it? I have no idea.

I stumbled on this piece unexpectedly while visiting the MCA. The museum was close to my hotel, and I was in town for a client project (and consequently traveling alone) so I stumbled out of my warm, elegant hotel room (props to the James Hotel for its exquisite design and customer service) into the blustery shrill that is Chicago weather, and walked a few blocks over to the museum. After I perused a powerful exhibit on Sex, Drugs and Rock and Roll, I walked upstairs to see their collection highlights. It was there that I encountered Kiss.

Transitioning between galleries, I entered a generously-sized room with a sculpture of a couple on the floor in the far corner. I approached them at an angle that exposed only their tangled legs and embracing arms. As I moved closer, I noticed that the body parts were moving, albeit ever so slightly. They had the air of a pornographic Disney-animatronic: stiff joint movements, slow gestures, mechanical poses. The moving figures were powerful- the sculpture felt alive, but in a plastic manner. Then the figures moved suddenly, and the woman aggressively mounted the man, and began to dry —, well, you know. These animatronics certainly were more convincing now! Then, she did it. The sculpture looked at me—made eye contact with me!— and I suddenly realized that they were actually two, real-live people who had been moving so slowly and scientifically that I assumed they were fake.

So that's Sehgal's Kiss. I stood there transfixed with it for 20 minutes until I ran and called my brother in order to release the joyful energy I had been storing watching this piece of total genius. I explained the rest of it to my brother: how the couple slowly evolves into poses of famous artworks (Rodin, Klimt, etc.) and how the couple does the piece for a solid 3 hours until a new couple takes over, seamlessly taking the last pose of the previous couple and continuing the choreography. It was brilliant.

Kiss isn't a performance piece, even though it's two people performing an artwork. I don't know how I can justify that statement, but when you see it, you'll understand. Performance art is bull#$%*, usually conceptual masturbation that no one understands other than the creator. It also has a start and a finish. Kiss doesn't. I would, like the MCA, argue that it's a "living sculpture." This is their thoughts:

Kiss is a sculptural and contemplative work in which two dancers move slowly and consistently through a prescribed choreography. Leisurely kissing and touching, the dancers eventually come to resemble embracing couples from historical paintings. Both real and constructed, representational and artificial, Kiss immediately draws viewers into a subtle engagement with their personal experience of intimacy.

Presented with Collection Highlights, Kiss articulates the role of the visitor by asking how one experiences, defines, and interacts with art in a museum and generates a connection with the viewer in the moment of engagement when art comes to life.

I think the most brilliant aspect of the piece was it's context. No ropes, no stage, no lighting. It was merely two people rolling around a museum floor, with no apparent borders to where they might roam.

As a designer, I was blown away by the careful choices and decisions by the artist; the pace, the choreography, the lack of music, the border-less canvas. These were decisions which all collided to create a masterpiece that left an indelible mark on my heart.

Ralph Caplan has argued (quite convincingly) that the best design of the 20th century was the "sit-in." He lauds the protest as an ingenious solution to a complex problem. Efficient, potent, and unexpected, the sit-in had exceptional success in an unprepared world. I would say the exact same thing as Caplan about the art world and Sehgal's piece. This thing hit the world like a Mack truck, and it will never be the same. And that's a good thing.