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Tuesday 2 December 2008

Procreation Part 1




Procreation photo documentation by Maria Agiomyrgiannaki

November 2008 must have been one of my most eclectic of months work wise, and one of my most unsung pieces of work Procreation finally got it's public debut. Procreation was a solo performance installation created for the Act Art annual event at club night XXL's home at The Arches in London Bridge. It's a rare occasion these day's to don the role of the performer within my own installations, finding it simpler to stand back and observe the whole image and situation from more of a directorial view point. However with Procreation that mode of creation was completely thrown on it's head, my role was of a passive yet guarding masked body to the blank canvas of the installation. Black perspex cubes on trestles marked out a creative work station, where three trays of paint lay. A monitor flickered whilst a motion sensor CCTV system recorded any presence that walked in front of it, the guardian initially invited the Act Art audience to participate. A blank canvas lay against the wall and the reaction to the whole situation was completely open....

Three hours later my head was in severe pain from the tight mask I had been strapped into. My body was close to frozen and I had been encrusted in the paint that was placed on the table, I had also lost count of the amount of interactions from audience members, beyond a hundred for sure, the ones that had groped me were quite well remembered and also a beautiful experience where a girl had tried to clean the paint from my body, it was almost as though she had felt my pain. It was now time for my exit and at 11pm I walked straight back to the dressing room.

I had not imagined the response that this piece would have created, had I not given in to the physical restraints the performance could have continued throughout the night as did the installation. However I wanted to leave with positive experiences and a sense that this could be part one of an installation that will definitely grow.