Photo: Dennis Friedler
My work continues with an excerpt from Michel Serres' THE FIVE SENSES, contributed by Sarah Bliss, transcribed over two performance periods, Sixth Week and Seventh Week. I added an audio narration of the text for audience members to listen to; a pair of headsets are now available outside the space for the duration of this series. Many thanks to Alex Buchanan, a photographer and mariner, for performing Serres' text through spoken narration.
This week I deployed both windows on either side of the door as loci for deconstruction and re-creation, respectively. I set up two folding tables to create raised platforms, setting my full body squarely in each window, using a short set of stairs to allow for safe ascending and descending. I took my scissors to the first half of the excerpt in one window and completed spinning the second half of the excerpt in the other. I considered the front door as a liminal boundary for my passage between alternating actions.
I was outside briefly to adjust the positioning of the headset when I was greeted by three friends - they asked if they could follow me inside...it was cold. I decided to go with this. They sat quietly with me in the space, allowing me to settle into performance without speaking. It was good to have them with me in the interior. I've been thinking about these divides - inner, outer - what passes through. When Dennis entered the space to photograph - my trio departed.
Photo: Dennis Friedler
In the space this evening was an installation connected to Mobius' collaboration with Together Festival. A central feature was a standing pedestal with an internally-illuminated chess board, as in a light box. I placed Bob's picture in the center of the chess board, his visage bathed in cool blue light. Notwithstanding the rich allegories of chess, the exact alignment of the chess board apparatus with the front door gave me pause. In some cultures, passage of the souls of the dead take time to complete their journeys. Is Bob's soul still in transit? This question occupied my thoughts as I moved between these windows of transformation.
My intention with Alex's audio narration was to set it to loop. I was not able to solve this problem in time for tonight's performance so I equipped myself with a kitchen timer set to 11 minutes, the run-time of the recording. The short, loud ring of the timer was a signal to cease my action (whether cutting or spinning), descend the stairs, set the audio to replay, re-set the timer, and ascend the alternate platform to take up the next action. This movement between actions, between worlds, was repeated at every timed interval for the two-hour duration.
Photo: Dennis Friedler
For this performance I switched from using a drop spindle to a side-winder, a hand-crank apparatus. Spinning yarn on a side winder creates the exquisite effect of "ballooning", a phenomenon of physics and a highly-studied subject within industrial textile manufacture that I'd like to learn more about. I've long been fascinated and mesmerized by the predictable expansion and contraction of this geometric surface, fading into momentary disappearance, at times replicating itself into two or even three balloons.
What's at the root of these forms and what might they say about dimensions of travel, of passage?
This contribution came through the mail slot:
And from Alex Buchanan, my performance text narrator:
