PigsofTodayaretheHamsofTomorrow

A letter to Marina Abramovic

2010-01-25T08:25:00.000-08:00

Dear Marina,

Had you not had the misfortune to fall ill in New York, I hope you would have been here. Many Dartington College of Art students engaged with this project in the hope of meeting and collaborating with you.

Our experiences of the project are, as to be expected, mixed. However, I believe I can speak on behalf of my fellow students. When we learned you were unable to attend, we were, all the more, documenting The Pigs of Today are the Hams of Tomorrow for you.

You will have our perceptions.

You will possess our responses.

You are not here to make memories.

Instead, we will act as your eyes, ears and scribes.

Scribbling what you might want to know.

What do you want to hear, Marina?

I hope the material and work we have created sits well in the archive of your newly established institution.

I would like, also, to extend an invitation to you for you to consider attending our final [never-forever-over] end of year event - The Dartington Festival - taking place from Wednesday 16th to Sunday 20th June 2010.

Yours truly,

Sarah Gray

s.gray@dartington.ac.uk

The fast, uncaring truth from the generation you are trying to engage with

2010-01-25T08:23:00.000-08:00

Tell me. Love me.

Don't forget me.

I am the document I create.

I am preserved.

2010-01-25T04:44:00.000-08:00

Second Life: Superheroes of the surreal

Strange things live in second life; a universe where everybody wears a mask.

I couldn’t work it out.

Was this a world for online gamers or virtual lovers? The game is one of reinactment. Like children performing a play made up of memories. The fantasies and fictions, which are part of the subconscious of the media-fed generations. Avatars and characters engaging in alien, dream-like scenerios. Who are these people; a party of comically created caricatures of the programmer? Each pixelated persona is performing a strange, shifting tribal dance, they are often jumping off the screen.

The only ‘honest’ avatars seem to represent Eva and Franco. They always are naked, vunerable and act as our protagonist couple. They are lovers, collaborators, filmstars, heroes!

The spectator becomes absorbed by the light of the projection – the screen absorbs audiences. I questioned whether our being there had any affect upon the Second Life. Whether we could converse or control these avatars. It didn’t seem so.

They may fly.

Trees may grow.

Bodies overlap and merge.

Am I missing something?

I walk over to the computers…

Standing behind the silver machines driven by the artists, Eva and Franco, like organists. Pressing keys and buttons to engage in some sort of textual forum, all the digital ‘0’s and ‘1’s calculated and configured by the software, producing a visual Second Life for the spectator to interpret.

The game starts with the reinactment of Marina Abramovic and Ulay’s performance, Imponderilla, the two naked bodies stand facing one another. Hypnotised or meditating with and/or by each other. Every other body squeezes between them to get by, some bodies turn away in disgust.

The Police never came.

The sounds in the Slaughter House echoes through the performance rooms, the sharpening of knives, nextdoor, makes for a very unsettling backdrop for the other performances. I am sat on a wooden crate with fleece blankets. The sound of metal on metal at a steady pace is endless. It is the Slaughter House’s new rhythm and now everything moves to that repetitive punctuation. Second Life responds to this, the slicing through the air, with the hollow sounds of the synthetic, computer generated footsteps, the keyboard typing and some sort of Polaroid camera sound byte.

I feel ill at ease.

On edge. Maybe this Slaughter House has something to do with it. The smell of the dead pig at the entrance. I do not like being here. So cold and hard – durational discomfort. The audience are going through something here too, is it a drill? An endurance test?

I suddenly feel confined within this atmosphere, like I am for the chop! Utter discomfort. Perhaps this voyeuristic position I find myself in is too much. Watching Abramovic's performance, that I have read so much about, I am seeing reinacted in real time. But not real life, for these fictitious characters have no bearing on reality or the consequences of a policed society.

I feel a great distance between me and the work. The bucket of LSD, which Eva and Franco are so keen to release, has hit the water system – and I haven’t had a drop.

The Performance Market - 22nd January 2010

2010-01-23T06:00:00.000-08:00

The sun broke away from the clouds at lunchtime

And shining through the Market hall windows

The light touched the soil bordering the walls

(outside the men's toilets)

And the green fingers of the artist

Guerilla gardening

A holy act

Make the hard concrete soft and wet

Tender placement

Building a garden

Rich bedding to put the living to rest

Away from the bustling stalls

Nobody knowing how to interpret

Are they mad?

- or maybe outrageous

There is no rage here.

Singing the songs of pullover patterns

Shirts sewn with care and precision

Needles the "Ham Packs" emblem

Threads the armpit hair

Embroiders belly button and nipples

The 'regular' stalls advertising British martial arts and DVDs, shifting product for the goth, witch and worker. Wigs, confectionary and hams - there is a performance here.

Neglected stalls sit in wait for another shopper to come. For the Queen's face to grace their palm, in exchange for tack and bric-a-brac.

The markets rhythms and patterns creates a code

We have interrupted the code

Some enjoy this

Others don't

Made in

Fresh from

Shipped from overseas

Flight and travel

Magnet

Central

Core

Distribute

Carve

Separate

Package

Weighed

Paid for

Charged

Short changed

Lied

Thieved

Eaten

Chewed

Spat

Tread

Walk

Sight

Window

Stall

Stop

Scan

Bright

Shiny

Magpie

Lucky

Need

Want

Can't

Afford

Bulk

Buy

Bought

Sought

Debt

Refund

Replaced

Displaced

The slaughtered pig

In pieces

Will be put together again -

IN-TRO-DUCTIONS

2010-01-21T15:08:00.000-08:00

There, over in Plymouth, is a thing. A thing called Pigs of Today are the Hams of Tomorrow.

Curated by Plymouth Art Centre in collaboration with Marina Abramovic, the weekend-long event, is happening - but without Marina.

We documenters / stalkers are dotted about the Royal William Yard. We write, we film, we tweet. Stalking, talking and Stweeting. The Dartington students, invited on behalf on the Marina Abramovic, are documenting the performances, symposium, market and other happenings throughout. All work will be compiled and selected to show at the two-month long exhibition at the Plymouth Arts Centre. With only a one-day turn around, this is is going to be tough!

Today, on this dreary and rather miserable wet day, we began our process. The highly anticipated highlight of the day was due - to meet the internationally renowned artists, Marina Abramovic. A truly exciting time. But the whispers began, suggesting that Marina was in fact unwell and had not crossed the Atlantic from New York yet!

The launch was started with Bloody Marinas made with Plymouth Gin, one of many generous sponsors. Soon the Complaints Choir, consisting of local people singing about the things that get on their goat, filled the gap where Marina was expected to open the event.

Once it was announced and became common knowledge that Marina was too ill to attend, the room was still. The performance artist is not here. Instead she is taking part in the durational performance we all have experience of; the flu!

Could it even be Swine Flu!? If so, then we can only hope that the pigs of today do not infect the hams of tomorrow.