LabBodies
Reverb
November 1 – December 15, 2019
When a work of live art is completed, there is often a space of stillness. The space between the audience, performance, and the site of the performance itself have been transformed through an astro-physical shifting of molecules that took place after that live art action. What can performance artists do with that shifting?
For Reverb, the selected works were based on the power that the curators experienced when they witnessed these live works take place. After the performance, a video was created. The video documentation is never the same as the active experience. The mood in the room cannot be captured with the film, the energy that is exchanged between a performer, the audience, and the space is hard to capture with photo and film. Some performance artists choose not to document their work.
However, many artists document the live art experiences that they create in the hope of expanding its audience. Some performance artists document the work with the intention of creating an entirely different artwork based on the live experience. This show demonstrates the strength of this praxis. Instead of creating one live art, these artists have expanded the concept of their live art and developed it to the second power. It is an exponential performance.
There are a number of experiences that can be gained from the live experience of viewing a performance artwork: the esoteric, the ephemeral, the mundane, the profound, the public moment, and the private moment. These performances touch upon at least one, or all of these components. As you watch the digital video reverberation of these live performances, see if you can catch the spirit of the live work.
FEATURED ARTISTS:
Antonius-Tín Bui (USA)
Nicoletta de la Brown (USA/Panama)
Emma Howes (Canada/Germany)
Justin Kennedy (US Virgin Islands/Germany)
Lynn Hunter (USA)
Sepideh Khodarahmi (Sweden/Iran)
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LabBodies is a performance art laboratory based in Baltimore, Maryland that provides a format for artists working in the arena of performance art to exhibit their work, with the primary values of collaboration, experimentation, and interaction they have collaborated with arts venues throughout Baltimore and beyond. To date, LabBodies has showcased over 100 local, regional, national and international performance artists. The Laboratory was founded in 2014 and is under the direction Hoesy Corona and Ada Pinkston.
