Documentation of a Performance

How to get through a boring performance while sitting in an audience.

In a small quiet lecture theatre I begin my performance. For the first few minutes I let a small but adequate audience read the first 3 and a bit instructions. I wait to see them getting agitated at being given more than enough time to read these instructions slowly at least 3 or 4 times. But still I wait.

How to get through a boring performance while sitting in an audience

1. Try to watch or listen to the performance. If you are just to bored, or cant get into it, follow the next step
2. If you can try to get up and say you are going to get a drink of water or going to the bath room. Then you can take a short walk.
3. Play with your phone. Most phones have games, if not play around with the settings
4. Look at the audience and see if you know …

The blackboard in which theses instructions are wrote on reminds me of an old school blackboard. You know, the revolving ones which were about a long time ago before schools got filled with horrible whiteboards and that that crap technology has brought us- interactive boards.

I feel its time to revel the next instructions. I move from my place along side the blackboard and using the bar placed along it I slowly pull it up so that instruction 3 sits on the top (just in case anyone hasn’t got round to finishing it yet). The rest of the bored reveals the end of instruction 4 and numbers 5-7. The bored squeaks as I do this whining its self with the lack of entertainment im providing.

3. Play with your phone. Most phones have games, if not play around with the settings
4. Look at the audience and see if you know somebody
5. Look up at the ceiling and count the tiles or wooden planks
6. Do isometric exercises which are not obvious. You don’t want to embarrass anyone
7. If you know you are going and have a hoodie and an iPod, hide the iPod in your hoodie pocket, run the cord through the inside of your hoodie put the earphones on and jam

I go back to my place at the side of the board, resume my vacant expression and posture and wait. Again I give just enough time for the audience to grow tired of the repetitive reading. I head back to the board and use the second bar which is now at the bottom of the board to revolve the text up to instruction 5. Numbers 6- 8 follow below it. Again the bored lets out is wails of disgust.

5. Look up at the ceiling and count the tiles or wooden planks
6. Do isometric exercises which are not obvious. You don’t want to embarrass anyone
7. If you know you are going and have a hoodie and an iPod, hide the iPod in your hoodie pocket, run the cord through the inside of your hoodie put the earphones on and jam
8. If you have a program, count the number of words in it, then read it backwards

The audience waits for the next act but nothing happens. Still I stand by the board in my position of nothingness while the time slowly runs away with its self. By now the audience grows restless and chatting begins to occur. I decide its time to continue. I head back to the board and pull on the bar. The board turns on its self showing again the first bit of text. This time the audiences chatter muffles the painful creaking of the blackboard.

How to get through a boring performance while sitting in an audience

1. Try to watch or listen to the performance. If you are just to bored, or cant get into it, follow the next step
2. If you can try to get up and say you are going to get a drink of water or going to the bath room. Then you can take a short walk.
3. Play with your phone. Most phones have games, if not play around with the settings
4. Look at the audience and see if you know …

I stand back on my spot with no sign of pampering to the whims of the audience. The time ticks by slowly as the audience get even more restful. They settle back down in anticipation as I walk back to the board. I pull the bar back round so instruction 3 again appears at the top.

3. Play with your phone. Most phones have games, if not play around with the settings
4. Look at the audience and see if you know somebody
5. Look up at the ceiling and count the tiles or wooden planks
6. Do isometric exercises which are not obvious. You don’t want to embarrass anyone
7. If you know you are going and have a hoodie and an iPod, hide the iPod in your hoodie pocket, run the cord through the inside of your hoodie put the earphones on and jam

The noise level erupts again as they realise I will return to my usual spot of propping up the blackboard. The waiting game continues but this time gets longer as I see how far I can push it. The long awaited return to the blackboard comes again.

5. Look up at the ceiling and count the tiles or wooden planks
6. Do isometric exercises which are not obvious. You don’t want to embarrass anyone
7. If you know you are going and have a hoodie and an iPod, hide the iPod in your hoodie pocket, run the cord through the inside of your hoodie put the earphones on and jam
8. If you have a program, count the number of words in it, then read it backwards

As I return to my spot a ripple of applauds begins. If the audience wants an end to this repetitive torment I am not the one to provide them with it. I commence with the waiting for the next turn of the board. Confusion covers the faces of some of the audience’s faces. Do they not understand? At the back a few await eagerly for my next move. The board turns again.

How to get through a boring performance while sitting in an audience

1. Try to watch or listen to the performance. If you are just to bored, or cant get into it, follow the next step
2. If you can try to get up and say you are going to get a drink of water or going to the bath room. Then you can take a short walk.
3. Play with your phone. Most phones have games, if not play around with the settings
4. Look at the audience and see if you know …

On my return to my standing spot the sound of people gathering there belongings fill the air. A few leave. I remain standing there looking out into nothingness. I wait. Time for the next turn.

3. Play with your phone. Most phones have games, if not play around with the settings
4. Look at the audience and see if you know somebody
5. Look up at the ceiling and count the tiles or wooden planks
6. Do isometric exercises which are not obvious. You don’t want to embarrass anyone
7. If you know you are going and have a hoodie and an iPod, hide the iPod in your hoodie pocket, run the cord through the inside of your hoodie put the earphones on and jam

I stand back in place …

The next turn

5. Look up at the ceiling and count the tiles or wooden planks
6. Do isometric exercises which are not obvious. You don’t want to embarrass anyone
7. If you know you are going and have a hoodie and an iPod, hide the iPod in your hoodie pocket, run the cord through the inside of your hoodie put the earphones on and jam
8. If you have a program, count the number of words in it, then read it backwards

The process repeats. Constantly revolving. More people leave the room. By now about 30 minutes have passed. I am left with two audience members. They continue to watch and I continue to revolve the blackboard. The board continues to wail loudly whenever it is forced to switch position.

The process repeats…

Again and again it mocks the remaining audience with its increasing boredom.

It continues to turn and I continue to wait.

There is a stand of between the two remaining audience members who wish to push them selves through the ever increasing monotony in order to be the last man standing.

Still I continue. Waiting and turning, waiting and turning.

Another person leaves. I am left with one remaining person who wishes to fight this tedious performance to the bitter end. He shuffles around the seating, counts the tiles, looks around the room for something to do, something to read, something to free his mind from what he is watching.

I repeat my action

Wait

Repeat

Wait.

The boredom takes hold and he leaves the room.

I follow.

The Steeplechase Flourish

For the passed two week I have taken an hour out of every day to teach my self this new trick. The steeplechace flourish. Using the amazing wikihow I have learnt the art of rolling a coin over my knuckles. I am now a master of my art.

http://www.wikihow.com/Roll-a-Coin-on-Your-Knuckles

A quote from the studio

'Its a great piece of work. Didnt see it though.'

Jill Magid - Authority to remove

I saw this exhibition back in mid September. At the time (even though I enjoyed it) I didn’t see the relevance to my practice now I feel stupid that I didn’t. The exhibition consists of documentation of Magids long involvement with the AIVD in which she was commissioned to make work for there head quarters. Throughout this time Magid uses the institutions rules to such an extent that they become absurd. She follows rules to the extent that they no longer make sense or follows them in order to break them/ twist them for self gain. (You now clearly see the stupidity in my thinking)

The storytelling aspect to this work is what grabs me the most in terms of documentation of a live act. The work tells a story of what happened during the time spent there but due to the regulations could not be done in certain ways. The beauty of this way of documentation to me is the idiosyncratic way in which an audience is asked to interpret it. Within live art the ephemeral nature of it makes it important to actually be an audience member as you will never yet the same experience again either though re-enactment or documentation. The storytelling way of documenting for me reproduces another idiosyncratic experience.

Where as photo documentation remains static storytelling has a way of moving within out minds creating yet another idiosyncratic experience. One could argue that video is a better way of documentation of live art which on the whole I agree with, however in terms of durational work I feel differently. I feel the need to stick with something for a prolonged period of time or indeed get the gist of process that develops with time gets lost within a video documentation format. This in my opinion is addressed in within Magids work within it text based nature which tells the story of the experience or process more adequately than other documentation might have.

"Cours de soir", de Jacques Tati (1965)

A beautiful bit of comic how to.

A little closer

Email recieved from Guiness world records-

CLAIM ID: 288582
MEMBERSHIP ID: 253998

THIS IS ONLY FOR YOUR REFERENCE

Dear Miss Lauren O'Day,

We are glad to inform you that your record application has been transferred to our internal system.

You do not need to do anything at this stage.

We will process your claim and to give you an answer in 4 weeks. At Guinness World Records, we take great care to evaluate every claim we receive. Before we accept or reject a new record proposal, we always carry out claim-specific research, which may require the expertise of external consultants.

In the attached document called General Information on Record Breaking, you will find an overview of the record breaking process.

PLEASE DO NOT SEND ANYTHING FURTHER AT THIS POINT.

Once we have considered your record suggestion, we will contact you with our decision. In case of success, we will send to you the current world record, the guidelines you must follow and details of the evidence you must compile.

If your claim is urgent and you need an immediate answer, you can use Fast Track which ensures that your record application is considered by our expert team in just 3 working days. To upgrade to Fast Track please log on www.guinnessworldrecords.com, select the claim number 288582 and click on 'Upgrade to Fast Track'.

Finally please do not reply to this email, if you wish to contact us, please log in on www.guinnessworldrecords.com, select the claim ID 288582, and click on 'Make an Enquiry', we will reply within 3-5 days.

Thank you for contacting Guinness World Records.

Best regards

Records Management Team
Guinness World Records

Claim Number 1

longest time spent pacing between two points

My claim will take up to 6 weeks. Fingers crossed

Rules and regulations

Will your record proposal be accepted?

Before you proceed with your record proposal, check if your idea is likely to be accepted. Remember: the record must be quantifiable, verifiable, absolute, not too specific or specialized, of international interest, an absolute superlative and breakable.

We recommend that if you are making a claim/proposal for what you believe to be a new category, you take the time to review the following checklist. It gives examples of records that we will accept, and ones we would not, in a number of areas that are very popular.

Please note that if your suggestion is clearly one that we list as being a category we do not accept, but you proceed with making a claim, we reserve the right not to reply.

Is your proposed claim/record...

o a 'first'?

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o based on your nationality, race or religion?

o based on your disability and/or medical condition?

o about poetry or art?

o based on an animal’s weight or breed?

o for driving between two points in the least amount of time, or covering the greatest distance in a motor vehicle in a set time?

o for the smallest example of a particular item or object?

o for the largest example of an everyday object?

o regarding chain letters/emails or collecting greetings cards, business cards or compliment slips?

o that you claim to have the most degrees, professional qualifications or best examination results?

Once you have checked your claim against the above and feel that it is of interest to us here at Guinness World Records*, please click the "Next" button below.

Value

I’ve been thinking about documentation, in particularly my problem with it. I think this anxiety about it has been heightened by the up and coming portfolio hand in that includes documentation of work. Here in lies the conundrum. If my critical question is about the need or the problems of documentation how can I justify documenting my own work even if it is for educational purposes? This leads me to think about the value of documentation, surely all documentation is there to give validation to the work. Whether it be in the educational context of marking or in a gallery context of gaining an audience or promoting of the piece, it all leads back to worth. Whatever happened to art for arts sake? I was thinking about this on the way in today. Is art that is seen by no one still art? Again this leads back to the importance of a witness. Is the intention of this witness important? Can the witness be a passing member of the public that may or may not acknowledge that the piece or indeed anything is actually happening? This would surely lead to the neglecting of the ‘feedback loop’ but is this important? Who am I making art for? This is the question I need to answer first. The relevance of documentation is subsequent to this question. Or is it? Even if this is so, in terms of performance, the relevance of documentation is overshadowed by the importance of liveness and aura which, despite the necessity of it, documentation kills. Is necessity the be all and end all in the documentation debate? I think not.

The importance in documentation of live art.

For myself and to gain relevance to other post I thought I would shove the questions for my critical study proposal up here.

The importance in documentation of live art.

Is the documentation of live art important? Can we ever get the same experience from documentation? Is documentation subverting the intention of a live art model? Thorough this subversion I intend to question the importance aura in relation to live art. With links to Walter Benjamin is modernity affecting the need for documentation? In turn this questions the materiality of performance. Surely the beauty of performance art is in its ephemeral nature but with constant emphasise on art as a commodity we need to question its Value? Furthermore this questions the value of an action and whether documentation of such an action has more or less value than the original.

In particular I wish to launch an inquiry into documentation of durational art. I will question the importance of the witness/ audience within a piece of work and there necessity within a documentation process. With reference to Teching Hsieh I will question there value within the piece as well as there gain from it in the way of necessity of the performance actually happening.

In favour of documentation and relation to Marina Abramovic I will look at documentation through preservation in terms of Re-enactment of a performance. In this sense I will take into account the importance of process and whether or not the documentation can stand alone as a piece of work.

Overall I wish to question the necessity of documentation within a performance art model and whether or not in doing so the ‘liveness’ is lost.

How to give a gift

My first attempt as a wikihow contributor.

http://www.wikihow.com/Give-Gifts

World record attempt leading onto 101 other concepts somewhat linked.

Yes you read correctly I, Lauren O’Day, am going to make a world record attempt! Of what exactly I don’t know but time next year I WILL be in that book. In order to gain acknowledgement for my new found knowledge/ skill I will attempt the ultimate challenge for the weird and wonderful by being the best in the world at it. I think what it all leads back to is the desire for fame.

Give me some credit.

Acknowledgement

Find a place in history

Personal endeavour to a useless extent.

Commodification of aspiration.

Exposure = value and worth

How do we give something value – proximity changes with knowledge – authenticity = value – link to Bejamin – reproduction of feeling? Can this have relivance?

‘It’s a nice piece of work. Didn’t see it though.’

Self documentation. – aura/ presence technology disrupts presence?

Ritualistic quality of such an event- society needs to re-enact ritual to gain purpose.

Links to Barthes and jean Baudrillard? Consumption more important than production. Obtaining of value.

OK GETTING A LITTLE OUT OF HAND HERE SHALL POST THIS ONE THEN COME BACK TO INDIVIDAUL POINTS AND THERE RELEVANCE IN LATER BLOGS.

WikiHow

WikiHow is my new love! This interactive ‘how to’ guide is a personal endeavour freaks Bible. It has everything from ‘how to kiss’ to ‘how to blow the shell off a hard boiled egg’. The true beauty of this piece of internet wonder is interactive quality. Like Wikipedia anyone is able to edit or add information to the site. You even get request for WikiHows to be written-

‘Tell good art from bad art’

‘Sculpt with food cans and boxes’

‘Obtain success as an independent artist of group’

‘Procrastinate’

‘Attract contributors to Wiki’

‘Be a high achiever’

‘Sharpen your sense of timing’

Theses are Wiki’s that I will attempt to answer.

In attempting to gain as much useless knowledge as possible I feel the need to give some back. Is all knowledge good?

Attempt to gain purposefulness though the useless. Though is it useless?

Knowledge = Power. Does all knowledge hold the same weight?

Skill based knowledge? Is this the same?

Documentation

This morning on the walk in I began to think about documentation of a performance. I have never been great at documenting my work nor have I every really felt the need to and began to think about its importance. For me the power of a performance is gained by actually being there and I am often left thinking that documentation of such an event can never truly suffice. That is not to say in every case, the Joshua Sofaer documentational book perform everyday is indeed a piece of art in its self. But documentation for documentations sake really gets on my wick. Ok I’ll explain myself-

Over the summer I went to go and see the documentation of the Marnia Abramovic performance at the Whitworth gallery Manchester. The original piece required the viewer to commit at least four hours to the event in which several performances took place. They were required to sign an agreement and complete exercises which would aid them in viewing the performances before they were aloud to view them. To me this was a lesson in duration. She was asking the audience to invest a lot of time in the pieces which all had elements of duration.

The documentation however lovely, completely contradicted the work. Video documentation of the performances on individual screens meant I could hop from one to another at will with out investing a lot or indeed any time in some. I was not first confronted with the instructions to view (although they were there) or asked for a minimum commitment to the work, instead I was able to view what I wanted when I wanted how I wanted. To me this documentation completely lost the intent of the piece. I guess what I’m getting at is weather the piece needed to be documented at all. Again I think the importance of the witness comes into play. Is it enough for a witness’s recollection of such an event to act as documentation? In a storytelling way can the information and ideas of an event be passed on from person to person as a form of documentation? Is it enough to know that the event actually happened?

How to Spin a Pencil Around Your Thumb

http://www.wikihow.com/Spin-a-Pencil-Around-Your-Thumb

The aim was to teach myself to do something

The activity was pointless

Use of instruction and repetition

Personal endeavour to a ridiculous point

Unfortunately my performance of this got cut short before I could master the activity. I don’t really know how I feel about this mainly because of the events that followed; however, I know I do not wish to continue to learn how to do this. The point was to continually attempt the activity until I could do it but being stopped when I hadn’t mastered it put an end to it. I will never master this. O well new activity …..

Notes from a chapter/ A collective whole/ An external debate/ New rules.

The transformative power of performance

Its funny how when you’re reading something you automatically relate everything you possibly can to your own practice. This is what I did with the first few pages of the first chapter of this book. So must in fact the notes shown here no longer make any sense to me. It is an endless linking of concepts and ideas that slowly spiral out of control. I WANT EVERYTHING TO LINK UP, MAKE A COLLECTIVE WHOLE AND STILL MAKE SENSE.

This is a board of endless possibilities with need for resolve. It is small nuggets of concepts that attempt to form a whole through there linkage. This does not work.

Pick ONE Lauren! Pick one and play. Do not attempt to form a whole. There is too much for you to do everything all at once. Look for relevance where necessary. Do not find it in everything.

On the other hand are you doing what you suggested above? In a loose way are you indeed ‘following the rules to and excess so they no longer make sense?’ following your own subconscious set of rules? Following them to such an access so they no longer make sense to you? THERE YOU GO AGAIN LINKING EVERYTHING.

Make new rules Lauren. Make them you manifesto then exhaust theses rules as much as you have the others. FOLLOW THEM SO THEY NO LONGER HAVE RELEVANCE.

Amy Sedaris – I Like You.

http://www.amysedarisrocks.com/ilikeyoucd.htm (Audio Book)

An instruction devise that doesn’t take its self too seriously

Particularly pleasing is the audio book complete with music

I guess what’s interesting to me about it is the idea of personal endeavour without the effort. ‘I can do this and so can you’

Direct but in direct ‘[insert name here]’

Disregard of rules – makes up her own yet expects to follow her instructions

A Guide to Fearless Creating (Hushing)

Grocery Store Musical

A friend posted this on Facebook the other day and it reminded me how performance can be anywhere. (God what a stupid thing to say) I think I mean an audience can be anywhere/ anyone. (Or does that sound worse?) Anyway I think I needed that reminder. I think sometimes I forget how much a little comedy and having the ‘Bollocks’ to do something go far. Sometimes I/ an audience take things to seriously.

Again it makes me think about audience and witness. The importance of a captive audience? How much a witness/ audience needs to be informed? The difference between audience and witness?

Here it is the acknowledgement of a non-voluntary ‘Witness’ that is important. Although in a traditional sense this should be thought of as an audience it is definitely a witness. Is this terminology important? Is willingness important? Especially in relation to conformity?

(I think I may have begun to spout a load of nonsense! I know this had a lot of relevance to me when I first watched it but though technology not being my friend I have completely forgot its importance. I hoped by writing about it anyway it would come back to me... obviously not. I am just talking my self in circles of questions)

I think what is becoming more and more important to me is audience. Who are they? Do they know they are an audience? The knowingness of them, there conformity, and indeed do I even need them at all?

Moreover I think it may have been a jolt to remind me to inject some spontaneity and wit back into my work.

GOD HOW MUCH CAN ONE PERSON SAY ‘I THINK’?!? APOLOGIES!

The promise of something to come

This is the result of what I did yesterday. Fuck All. Its strange how sometimes no matter how much you want to do something you can’t. It is filled with potential. Sometimes to such an extreme that it make the act so unbearable. Can this potential be an event in its self?

It is that potential that I now realise was the start of Tim Crouch’s piece. The audience is conditioned to the location, they know that the performance has to start and therefore the potential of it happening makes it start.

Within my own work (pacing) it is this potential that makes an audience willing to watch a monotonous action for so long.

Again this makes me think about the importance of a ‘witness’.

In the interview with Tehching Hsieh in freeze the interviewer suggests that he felt no need to see ‘Clock piece’ and that by simply knowing that it was really happening was enough. Hsieh attributes this to the importance of a signal witness in spreading a message and starting a discussion. Is even this witness important? Can the potential of a work going to happen be enough?

Things to think about

Subverting live art model

Documentation of live art in particular Durational work

Process

Repetition

Importance of a ‘Witness’ to a piece of work; is it enough just to know about it?

Teching Hsieh- knowing the piece is really happening- spread the message to start a discussion.

‘Isolation in the midst of others’

Record of the moment/ process becoming the work

Narrative?

Documentation as work in its own right?

Time

Abramovic- re-enacting in order to preserve

Audience within durational performance- audience community

Present moment (preserve) only a record of moment.

Interaction of audience

Installation as record of piece?

‘doing the work is itself a reward’

Revolution Road: Rename the Streets!

Whilst waking around Zoo art fair a leaflet was handed to me. It accompanied video documentation of a performance of a group renaming streets (via a blackboard) in Cambridge in front of a group of spectators. The leaflet reads as an order of service for the day’s events. In this respect it both acts as a prop within the piece and documentation after. It documents its self without meaning to. For me this made video documentation no longer necessary. In fact to even know that the performance had been undertaken was no longer of importance to me. The instructional quality to the text made the piece for me. It made it able for the work to be re-enacted again and again or indeed in the first place. Is there any need for the performance to happen at all?

Within the text this need becomes apparent through the importance of the ‘Witnesses’. The witnesses confirm the impermanent changing of the street name as a permanent. Only the witnesses will acknowledge this as a ‘real’ change. This ritualistic nature is pivotal to the piece naming the witnesses as ‘more important than (an audience or participant), like witnesses at a wedding or godparents at a christening.’ It mocks the importance of ceremony whilst relying on it.

Things to think about…

Importance of an ‘audience’ within own work

Ritualistic quality to viewing as well as performing own work

The Author

The Author- Tim Crouch. 2^nd Oct 2009- Royal Court

A must watch that plays which traditional perceptions of audience within theatre. Walking in you instantly know your own involvement within the piece. Two blocks of tiered seating face each other so that audience looks at audience. Sitting my self on the front row I am instantly nervous of how much I was to be involved. This is until till it was brought to my attention that it would not make any difference where I sat; just by being there I was to be part of it. This audience participation and bridging the gap between actor and audience were to be played with through out the piece.

Still now I am not entirely sure how the audience settled down in order for the performance to begin. Without any traditional theatrical cues for the start of a performance the audience hush for the beginning. The audience conforms to traditions of the theatre without any lighting or sound cues. They feed off each other to start a chain reaction of quiet. This conformity to tradition continues throughout the piece with the aid of lighting and musical cues. Tradition is embodied in the audience without being enforced in the space.

Although at first I am captivated with the audiences’ reactions to each other and the piece I find myself getting sucked into the storytelling. I forget that I myself am being watched. I am part of the piece without realising it. My belief in the story increases with its instantaneity. Where fact stop and fiction begin? This question is heightened by the placement of the actors within the audience. The gap between audience and actor is being lessoned and therefore belief increases.

Others are forced into participation with questions directed at them by one of the actors. Nevertheless they are limited in there participation with direct questions with limed answers within a story telling context. They are led to believe they are the performance with actually affecting it.

In relation to my own practice this piece makes question my relationship to an audience. How much do I want an audience to participate? Tim Crouch does this by letting the audience know there limits to there involvement through traditional theatrical devises such as storytelling, music and lighting within a non-traditional context. The audience are conditioned to react in accordance to there context while being pulled out of there comfort zone. This enables Crouch to exercise control while playing with our expectations. Could this conditioning be used within my own work to control an audience without enforcing restrictions?