This week we had to pitch forward our group idea. We had come to a decision to try and incorporate homelessness. Our initial plan was to collect objects around the city which gestured toward homelessness and then we would create an installation. We then wanted to include some sort of narrative that derived from these objects, and incorporate a soundscape that made the public question what it is to be homeless and why people are? The gallery is a place of highly valued art and objects, placing this installation, we hoped would contradict to the space rather than conform. We wanted to make a statement about society and its views on the homeless, hoping our piece of performance art could maybe change them. However in giving the pitch we were asked lots of questions and found that many of our ideas were unjustifiable in relating to the gallery. Along with this we also found that working with a group of homeless people would not be easy and also in the time we have for the project, it would be almost impossible to build any sort of relationship with them. This then meant we could not fulfil our task, so our only option was re-evaluate back to where the idea stemmed from and see if we could come up with something new.
We thought back to each idea separately. An installation. If the objects were not relating to homelessness, could they relate to something else? We had the idea to collect specific objects around Lincoln, ones which reminded us of homelessness. However, after some significant thinking we made a decision that will hopefully make a small yet effective change. We will now instead collect homeless objects, ones which are lost, abandoned or broken. Items of no value. Yet if placed in a museum, will the public’s perception of these items change? Would they be Art? Does a plinth, glass or a frame define whether an item is of value? We will become curators of an installation of Art that is practically garbage. We realise that documentation is essential to performance art and have taken a specific interest to the idea of it being performative ‘documentation is performative in that it functions on it’s own terms and relies on the perception and engagement of the end user’ Whether or not our piece creates the outcome we intend, we would like the audience to become part of the documentation process and will need their engagement to create the experience. As a group we have also been highly interested in the idea of branching outside of the gallery and into a performance of the city “In contrast to the ‘White Cube’ gallery’s signification of emptiness, the urban landscape offers a profusion and complexity of signs and spaces” (Kaye 2000. Pg. 33). We want to somehow take the signs of the city and create an experience that displays our objects in an imaginative process. We thought back to the soundscape and are currently thinking of ways in which we could use sound to evoke a thought process into the objects narrative.
Works Cited
Kaye, N. (2000) Site Specific Performance. [Online] London: Routledge. Available from http://lib.myilibrary.com.proxy.library.lincoln.ac.uk/Open.aspx?id=32715 [Accessed: 24 March 2014]
Ledger, A. Ellis, S. Wright, F. (2011) The Question of Documentation: Creative Strategies in Performance Research. In: Baz Kershaw and Helen Nicholson (ed.) Research Methods in Theatre and Performance. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 162-185.