FLOCK/ MIRAGE 2011, Performance.  Gilded antique decoy duck, 3500 razorblades, text. Held as part of ‘Polyply 9: Animal’. Center for Creative Collaboration, London, England

FLOCK/ MIRAGE A mirage is defined as an optical illusion caused by atmospheric conditions, usually the refraction of light in heated air. The most well-known example is probably the false appearance of a distant sheet of water in a desert, or on a hot road.

I used 3,500 razorblades to create the illusion of a pond onto which a decoy duck could be placed.
I first ‘read’ the wooden duck, twisting and turning the shape with my hands as my eyes followed the 100 word text letter-punched into its gilded body.  The reading of the animal body reminds perhaps of a medical inspection such as performed by a veterinarian, but also as a form of extispicy as practiced in ancient Mesopotamian and Roman
times (and may still be found in many parts of the world today). Extispicy is the act of inspecting anomalies in the entrails of animals in order to
predict or divine future events.

One could well argue that extispicy was indeed one of the earliest forms of autopsy performed by knowledgeable individuals in order to help determine general ecological information about an area – information and expertise that would no doubt be valuable to nomadic peoples.

During Roman times haruspices (practitioners of extispicy) became known as ‘auspexes’, a term ostensibly drawn from the Latin for ‘avis’ (bird) and ‘spectare’ or ‘specere’ (to see).  However, in this performance a representation of an animal – the wooden decoy – is inspected and one’s attention is drawn to the somewhat violent act of performing
the reading by hand: the decoy’s neck is twisted more than once in order to follow the text.

Once the action was complete I stepped barefoot onto the mirage (thus metaphorically walking on water) and placed the duck in the center of the illusion.

listen
there it is again
even as i whisper i hear it still
trailing my voice in perverse replication
almost the same but not quite
as if somewhere somehow out there
in the bouncing back and the going through
the muck and the rain
and the fleshy pouting grit
of it’s mispronounced migration
some words were irrevocably lost
whilst others were delayed
and found uninvited company strangely grafted
onto their limbs
before flocking to the edge of spring:
i didn’t say that
or say it in that way
much less mean for it
to come out suspended
like some
primordial mating call

Video stills, CROSSING OVER (for Santu) 2010, DVD, 4min 44sec. Edition of 5

CROSSING OVER A short 100-word text is recited with my lips close to the flame of a candle. The flame dances around as I recite the words. Each time a word is said too loudly the flame dies and the candle must be re-lit again.

The text was based on the idea of a soldier stuck on a battlefield without a gun, and how, in a moment of doubt he considers the possibility of killing the soldier walking right in front of him and to take his weapon for his own protection.

brother
hold the line
steady now
advance
keep those bullets close
when the man in front with the rifle falls
it’s all yours
or take it from him now
it matters so very little
though he may not be on the other side
he sure as hell is your enemy
you still have your hands
and they should be good for something
never see you coming in the crossfire
suckerpunch
throttlebytheneck
its over
in the blink of an eye
the agony of the long wait
mercifully stopped dead in its tracks
consider it a kindness
this crossing over
eyes wide open

Text for CROSSING OVER (for Santu) 2010, DVD, 4min 44sec

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Date: 28 April 2010, Performance lecture as part of ‘Tables of Thought’, European Artistic Research Network, Helsinki 28 -29 April

Medium: Performance with 100 animated video stills, 100 individually engraved razorblades, ladder, speaker and gold leaf

Duration: Approx 5 minutes (excluding Q&A with Henk Slager and audience)

listen
there it is again
even as i whisper i hear it still
trailing my voice in perverse replication
almost the same but not quite
as if somewhere somehow out there
in the bouncing back and the going through
the muck and the rain
and the fleshy pouting grit
of it’s mispronounced migration
some words were irrevocably lost
whilst others were delayed
and found uninvited company strangely grafted
onto their limbs
before flocking to the edge of spring:
i didn’t say that
or say it in that way
much less mean for it
to come out suspended
like some
primordial mating call

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

PHANTOM LIMB (2010)

Date: 22 March 2010, Medium: Performance with metronome, 100 individually engraved razorblades, speaker and gold leaf

Performance as part of  ‘Off the shelf: performance, film, video, poetry music’ –  An evening of live events staged by the Slade School of Fine Art (UCL) and presented by the Slade Word/Image Forum, Duration: Approx 10 minutes, (All photographs by Wayne Binitie)

Date: 18 February 2010, Medium: Residue of Performance lecture with metronome, text, 206 projected images

Performance resented as part of the GradCam Conference ‘Arts research: publics and purposes’, Dublin, Duration: Approx 10 minutes

Prospecter:

Person who prospects, esp. for gold, minerals etc

Specter:

[ORIGIN French, or Latin spectrum, from specere ‘look’]
1 An apparition, a ghost, esp. one of a terrifying nature or aspect. ▸ b In Epicurean philosophy, an image supposed to emanate from a corporeal thing.
2 fig. A haunting or terrifying presentiment. Freq. foll. by of. ▸ b A person resembling a ghost in appearance.
3 An image produced by reflection or other natural cause

Performance Description:

The work is part of a series of new projects all focused on exploring the history, mythology and impact of the discovery of gold in the ‘new world’ (Africa, America, Australia etc). For this work I wanted to pull a rabbit out of a hat, so to speak. It was a one-of performance and the work consisted of:

– A 206 word poem/ text read aloud and rhythmically timed with a wooden metronome

– 206 digital scans of rabbit bones covered in 23 ct gold & individually placed within a black hat (giving a total of one image projected per word)

– On average there are 206 bones in the human body.

During the performance each new stanza was set to a rhythm determined by the wooden metrome (40bpm, 80bpm, 120bpm respectively)

Afloat in Tethers Row

Date: 18 February 2010, Medium: Residue of Performance lecture with metronome, text, 206 projected images

This piece of writing was first presented as a performance on 8 May 2009 at University College London. It is exactly 100 words long and each word is engraved on an ordinary stainless steel razorblade (making for a total of 100 blades). The work is read aloud during the performance connecting the mind, body and text in one fluid action.

The text functions as a form if ‘incantation’ broadly defined as a form of ‘magical singing’, a spoken ‘charm’/‘chant’ through which to raise a spirit. The text must therefore be must be spoken aloud, or ‘intoned’, in order to fulfill its purpose.

‘Afloat in Tethers Row’ is a meeting of sorts between various elements including audience, artist, object, text, voice, the value of chance and the spirit of South African poet Ingrid Jonker to whom the piece is also dedicated.