The Lived Body: REDUX
Material: Hairless body (in all but head), 100 meters of black satin double sided berisfold 7 mm width ribbon, No. 15 Swann-Morton sterile disposable scalpel (retractable), 100 kg of salt forming a salt plane 1000x6000, 6 x molefay6 x profile lanterns, 8 x contact & hydroponic microphones (undisclosed) 8 x 10000 mm guitar leads, black LX tape (1 roll), 140x35 steel butt plug, 8 channel audio mix (undisclosed), large scale PA (undisclosed), antiseptic diffuser.Action: 25 minute performance consisting of pre and post space states and a 15 minute action featuring a failed walk across a salt plane in traverse, where a Being experiences major blood loss and is de/constructed through the viscera of extreme live noise, light, blood/salt, and darkness.
Context: A REDUX of the previous version of The Lived Body, this was showcased within The Island at Tempting Failure in 2014. Here, the previously exhibited version from Glasgow was redeveloped in collaboration with sound designer Lee Chaos, allowing further expansion over the orchestration and collaborative live manipulation of the sound between both. The work was also faster and featured intensified sound, light and blood loss.
The title of the work reflects a term coined by Maurice Merleau-Ponty whose theories have influenced the practice of the artist. The work is an active deconstruction of the Being of the artist, through the gaze of each individual witness. Creating a multiplicity of Self/s through Flesh and other, the action reconstructs Being beyond sight to immerse all in the space of the Body:
A dismembered, distorted body bleeds out in more ways than simply the obvious: a body displaced, a being displaced. A shared being that is reconstructed in the moment of perception between spectator & figure through an ephemeral intangible Flesh. A failed body, reformed to encompass all; beyond subject, beyond object, both embodied & disembodied, including you: your presence & perception.
Made possible with support from Arts Council England.
2014
Tempting Failure - Bristol, UK
Production - Andy Hopkins, Hannah Moore
Photography - Ceri Winrow & Tilly May