Inspired by Abramović

Spent my Saturday evening in watching The Artist is Present — a film about the artist Marina Abramović’s restrospective at the MoMA in 2010. I’d always been affected by the artist love story of Abramović and Ulay — whose performance art created together in the 70s and 80s is still very difficult to watch — the poignancy and intensity still resonates, and even through video clips the viewer is challenged and provoked.

I don’t think the story presented in this music video is accurate — but I love the eye contact between them and the emotions on their faces.

“This is what I think: to be a performance artist, you have to hate theatre. Theatre is fake: there is a black box, you pay for a ticket, and you sit in the dark and see somebody playing somebody else’s life. The knife is not real, the blood is not real, and the emotions are not real. Performance is just the opposite: the knife is real, the blood is real, and the emotions are real. It’s a very different concept. It’s about true reality.”