Venice, June 1st-4th 

INFR'ACTION VENICE 011

More than 50 international performance artists intervened in the public spaces in Venice in and around the Arsenale and the Giardini during the Previews of the Biennale.

INFR'ACTIONS is a nomadic periodic group intervention which does not announce itself. In Venice INFR'ACTIONS was hosted by the Academie Del Arte and took place in the academy as well as on the streets and places around the Biennale.

 

White Market Interventions:

1st June 2:00 - 6:00 pm

between Giardini and Arsenale;   [not] performing artist

 

2nd June 04:00 - 06:00 am

Piazza San Marco;   „Verbandelt“ and „Verschnürt“

 

3rd June 2:00 - 6:00 pm

Piazza Arsenale;   „Swan Canal“

 

4th June 2:00 - 3:00 pm

between Giardini and Arsenale;   „Clean your money here“

 

1st June 2 - 6pm

Between Giardini and Arsenale

(not) performing artist

Dorothea Seror and Claudia Kappenberg [Ms White and Ms Market] wander between the passers-by of the Giardini, a crowd made up of artists of INFR’ACTIONs, visitors of the Previews, tourists and inhabitants of Venice. The performers present themselves as [not] performing artists wearing black t-shirts with the text ‘[not] performing artist’ printed on the back and ‘a White Market project’ printed on the front. As such they constitute a barely noticible confusion in the steady flow of the passers-by.

This wearable art project enacts and promotes the ambivalent status of artists who do [not] take part in the Venice Biennale.

Photos: Jason Lim

 

 

 

2nd June 4 - 6am

Piazza San Marco

Verbandelt and Verschnürt

Two founding members of Black Market (Tomas Ruller and Zygmunt Piotrowski) invite the artists of INFR’ACTIONS to take part in an “Open Situation” on the Piazza San Marco, the most famous square of Venice. At this early hour the square is vacant except for two carabinieris, who appear content to observe the goings on.

About twenty artists arrive and begin to populate an area which is gently framed by the two Black Market artists, both dressed in black. Dorothea Seror and Claudia Kappenberg work separately today. Claudia Kappenberg lays out a multitude of shoelaces and ties them to her fingers thereby extending her hands. Moving across the square and to the water edge she drags the laces through the water and draws temporary lines on the paving stones. Dorothea Seror ties four large balls of string around four central lamp posts and unravels the balls to their full 100meter length and to the far corners of the square. She ties the ends to her body and winds the strings up continuously turning and rolling. Her movements cross the pathways of the other performers but she cannot change her course in her gradual entrapment. When the strings reach maximum tension she lays down and remains there until sunrise. Eventually she cuts herself loose with a knife.

Other interventions take place simultaneously, such as the ‘planting’ of a small set of grasses in the crevices of the paving stones (Brian Connolly) and the walking backwards and balancing of chinking glasses (Dominic Thorpe)… According to the tradition of Black Market events artists perform at the same time and at the same place, and brief encounters and interactions are possible.

 

Photos: Fausto Grossi, Jason Lim

 

3rd June 2 - 6pm

Piazza Arsenale

Swan Canal

Ms White and Ms Market prepare a durational intervention on the Piazza Arsenale. They attach long black ropes to two red poles and tie a white pillow into the middle. They walk to the top of the small footbridge which crosses the canal and slice open the pillow. A few feathers emerge from the densely packed bundle. Descending on either side of the bridge and onto the right and left side of the canal the performers stretch the ropes between them so that the pillow floats in mid air just above the surface of the water.

 

A gentle wind travels along the canal and over the pillow, picking up small amounts of feathers which hover briefly before landing on the water and drifting down the canal. At times the performers swing and shake the pillow to extract more feathers. In an even pace the two performers walk slowly along the canal, one on each bank, always leaning backwards to maintain the counterweight. When a boat approaches they lift the poles up to allow the boat to pass below the pillow. After about two hours the pillow is empty and the action is complete.

 

The performers tie a second pillow to the ropes and reposition themselves on either side of the canal. Just as the feathers begin to fly off and drift down the canal two boats with carabinieri appear. Due to an earlier visit by Shimon Peres to the Biennale there had already been police presence but no one interfered with the performance. Hence the two artists continue their process. However, this time a Carabinieri begins to gesticulate furiously and yelling something in Italian. The duo shifts upstream and away from the boats, maintaining the tension between them to keep the pillow lifted above the water. The boats come even closer, a Carabinieri jumps onto the quay and runs towards Ms White. Without further communication he tries to wrestle the pole from her whereby Ms Market almost falls into the water on the other side of the canal. Ms White tries to signal him in English, that the performers are willing to stop the action but the policeman takes a knife from his pocket and slashes the ropes. Under loud protest of the surrounding audiences the pillow falls into the water in the middle of the canal. A second security guard in plain clothes appears by Ms Market, takes her ends of ropes and pulls the pillow towards the water edge. The men return to the boats, then the flotilla glides past the performers and the audiences and disappears. The performers stop the intervention, audiences disperse slowly and the pillow drifts gradually down the canal towards the open see without further interference.

In this intervention an activity of the domestic realm (shaking of pillows) is performed in a public space. The rhythm of the action is thereby determined by the particular architecture of the place and by wind and water. The project also explores a collaborative mode of performance-interventions.

 

Photos: Fausto Grossi, Jason Lim, Nenad Bogdanovic

 

4th June, 2 - 3pm

Giardini

'Clean your money here'

Ms White sits on a park bench wearing a golden dress and golden shoes. She takes various objects from her golden handbag. Next to her on the bench a handwritten sign with the following text:

 

Clean your Money here! We wash and polish your money

coins - dry polish 10 cent - cream and polish 30 cent - sanding and polish 50 cent

paper - press 10 cent - wash and dry 30 cent - wash, dry and press 50 cent

 

Passers-by hand the performer coins and paper money for cleaning purposes. Without much prompting audiences engage in dialogue about the different grades of shades of political, economic and social soiling of currencies.

The intervention raises questions with regards to the evaluation of performance art.