Existere in Reflection

Guys, these are thoughts that I began noting down after the performances and whilst I was in America. I've tried to expand these thoughts since then but this entry just represents my initial reflection. I'll work on adding those other thoughts.

Existere in Reflection

Working towards the performance led us into a debate of how we best represent the events as well as the problems of documenting performance art in general. Our decision not to document the performance sculptures had a profound effect on how I, and I think we, experienced the work, how I reflect on it and how I engage with it now that the events have passed.

In preparing the project I had not appreciated how certain decisions would impact my experience of the performance, notably our choices to perform in the work ourselves and to not document the performance sculpture photographically. From the moment of the first performance until the last I found myself feeling somehow unfulfilled. It was a difficult sensation to digest and make sense of at a time when I expected to feel satisfaction.

The process was very different to anything I have encountered. Working with largely non professional performers we were challenged to construct and plan a physical and durational performance that would be flexible enough for people of all physical and artistic sensibilities to be involved with. It was also important for us to convey a feeling of the concept to the performers. As we, JocJonJosch, were all performing in the piece it was vital that this was all achieved during the rehearsals and preparation. Once the performances began we took up our role as performers, and were forced to let go of the control that we had held in our position as 'directors' and 'artists', accepting an unpredictable and uncontrollable course.

We became locked in the work, almost as if we were the oil strokes on a painting, the steel in a sculpture or a pixel in a photograph or video. Unlike a typical gallery or even theatre experience, we surrendered any further control of how the piece might be understood by the visitors; each performance sculpture was different in form, sometimes numbers of participants, always amount of audience, duration, sound, light etc…

Initially I felt frustrated at not being able to step outside of the performance and experience the piece as, and amongst, the audience. By taking part in the performance we were restrained from talking with visitors and explaining and discussing the work further, we were not able to hear their thoughts and appreciate their affirmation of the work's quality and value.

This compulsion to control the piece and its understanding (to visitors) as well as the desire for recognition and respect was poignant. The project had developed into a far more meaningful experience through this particular performance process; I had unexpectedly experienced the observations of the psychological state of our subject matter and the form that represented those ideas through the process of the project and participation in the performance.

As an experience and process, the form of the performance no longer held any value to me, it was the process and experience that had become significant.