PERFORMANCES

 

The Impotence of Art  ('6000 Chairs' 2004, Crytsal Palace, London.With Bettina Ganser.)


This performance was based on the idea of unrequited love. The blonde phallus wig follows the brown heart shaped wig, struggling to gathering the flowers she scatters. Once he has collected all her flowers, she turns to face him for the first time, then grabs all he has and starts the process again. On this occasion, in September 2004, the blonde wig actually bent in the wind, thus halting the performance after a few minutes, the performers are seen eating chocolates mini eggs after the event.

 

 

Liverpool Biennale 2004- Peepshow performance with Jeanine Woollard and Luna Montenegro.

Peepshow Performance
(Salzburg, Gallery Alcatraz, Salzburg, Aug 2003, with Jen Woollard)

The performance lasts around 30minutes, accompanied by Noel Coward’s ‘Mad dogs and Englishmen’. The performers are totally covered in food, except on their faces, with meats, pates, creams, chocolate spread, berries, salad vegetables, strategically placed fruits, sweets, pastries, breads, and so on. Each item of food has a relation to shape what they are concealing, ham strips wrapping the thighs for example. Whilst the performers eat from each other, the viewer is able to watch them through a fish eye lens positioned in the door of the performer’s space. The performers eat with elegant cutlery, fulfilling all of the clichéd rules of those captured in a mythological scene, but paradoxically, their eating manner is quite repugnant, spitting, and flicking food, showing all of their animalistic qualities. The idea for the performance comes from the relationship western society has to food, that being of feasting, a living painting of a glutinous scene. The piece suggests the notion of being consumed, to cannibalise, linking in to the Media images of women as objects to be devoured. The performers are presented as bacchanalian players(reminiscent of Botticelli’s ‘The Birth of Venus’). Encased in a white shell, surrounded by foliage, and covered in the most delectable foods, we proceed to eat one another, morsel by morsel.

 

 

Bergman Performance
(Salzburg, Gallery Alcatraz, Aug 2003, and Berlin Biennale Sept 2003, with Helen Schone)

The ‘Bergman’ performance likewise uses assumed cultural symbols of gender identity (in this case Austrian Tracht costume). Using a hidden Lycra limb extensions the performer (Helen Schöne) climbs like a mountaineer whilst nailing herself to the entire length of a wooden staircase, being bombarded at the same time with Mozart Kugeln, a Salzburgian speciality. I wear a Dirndel, and offer her help whilst playing folk music of the Alps(yodelling and brass instruments), which gives the piece a tempo.

Quintiple Wig 2002

 

 

T-shirt Performance (‘100% Cotton’ Gallery Alcatraz, Salzburg, Aug 2002, with Samatha Coippi)

In this performance I limited myself to using two white t-shirts, the basic idea being that we were going to sow ourselves in together, so we had one body and two heads, and then I would exit via my head hole, re-enter face forward, and then join Sam using the same holes in the cloth as she to put my arms and legs through, and then we would try to stand together. What could not be predicted was the amount of struggle and the contortions we would have to make to achieve this. The piece was accompanied by a tape of music I had been given and ended in each of us feeding one another a glass of wine. The performance physically described the difficulties of two persons working together and made a interesting reflection on the nature of collaborative work.

 

 

 

 

Lost Legionnaire Performance (‘Open to the Elements’,13th Sept 2003, Hampton Court , Herefordshire, with anonymous performer)

From absurd adornments to ridiculous rituals, appropriation of western traditional pageantry has provided rich inspiration for my work. In the ‘Lost Legionnaire’ performance I subvert the image of a knight in white armour, the archetypal hero, replacing cast metal protection for that of lace, ribbon and silk. Indeed during time of battle, the more a suit of armour was decorated the safer the wearer was, ornamentation indicating stature and rank, therefore ensuring being captured as opposed to being slaughtered. The de-masculinised legionnaire looks vulnerable and delicate, unfit for battle but defiantly standing guard. This piece was made especially for the castle where it was shown, which has it’s own dysfunctional history of lost nobility and squandered riches. I find it interesting that sites of heritage such as Hampton Court, which are suppose to represent national stability and pride, quite often have disconcerting secrets behind the elegant facades.

 

 

Rapunsel Wig  (‘Re:kindle’ Sept 2003, Highgate woods, ‘Open to the Elements’ Sept 2003)

This piece was made for a gallery at the Slade that had no windows; I found the clinical nature of the space very claustrophobic. I wanted to make a piece for the balcony, which when you go out on, you get a real sense of freedom from the panoramic view of London. That is why I decided to make an escape route. Using the fairytale myth of rapunsel, I plaited a 20 metre long rope of hair, complete with chinstrap and silk lining.