Shoot

"[Chris] Burden is the guy who, on November 19, 1971, in Santa Ana, California, produced a classic, or an atrocity (both, to my mind), of conceptual art by getting shot. “Shoot” survives in desultory black-and-white photographs with this description: “At 7:45 P.M. I was shot in the left arm by a friend. The bullet was a copper jacket .22 long rifle. My friend was standing about fifteen feet from me.” Why do such things? “I wanted to be taken seriously as an artist,”