Objecthood Literalist sensibilities and interactive arts getting back to life

In the fourth paragraph of Art in Theory, the literalist idea is given an interesting description which I find, links its self-separating sensibilities to modern art.  The author writes, "In fact, being distanced by such objects is not, I suggest, entirely unlike being distanced, or crowded by the silent presence of another person; the experience of coming upon literalist objects unexpectedly-for example, in somewhat darkened rooms-can be strongly, if momentarily, disquieting in a way"(826).  According to this description, the literalist intention wants to bring art works back to life, or reality.  It sets a perspective for the conditions of viewing a work, or, anything for that matter, and it is that the viewer himself is within the work; interaction between the viewers presence and the work and the space and rest of the audience are constant.  On such a level of, it theoretically becomes close to the non-art. In bringing the view back to the normalness of reality, literalist sensibility considers everything that frames a view of a work; therefore, what is termed, the everyday, is factor to strengthen or weaken the wholeness of an artwork (827).  I find the "nonrelational" and the "everyday" ironic in a way, since that seems to be the last achievement of literalist works if all audience members form their own separate relations with the work and their level of the ordinary.  

The literalist sensiblity finds its concept in seemingly formal aspects of work, such as shape and size, however, it is on these grounds that teeter back and forth between being interpreted as it wants to be, for example, a canvas, and what it is, a rectangle image in three dimensions that give literalist works their control.   

There is deconstructive character to the literalist achievement, in that brings they viewing of a work to the surface level, between what the object fundamentally is in reality instead of what it is in attempt, again for example, a painting.  This surface valuing then implies that there is no inherent value or relational meaning between things; nothing truely belongs together; anything can be put together.  

But I think this has been the goal of modern art for quite sometime.  Literalist ideas are just further extensions of this modern exploration.  The search to find new value, or, at the least, to break away from the old seems like an ancient characteristic, or a relation to, the literalist realm.  A difference between modern works and literalist works is that they are separated by ages of technological progress, which drastically changes the everyday, nonrelational experience.  Literalist ideas begin to separate from these modernist roots, but still retain the sensibility of sculpture, or painting; its former distinctions.

Since performance and interactive arts are growths of sculpture into a nonrelational sense, perhaps of art form, in some ways, interactive arts become relational as the work itself builds specific relations with viewers, based on their physical size, their shape, etc.