Three-part live action culminating in three-channel video, 2009
Marina Abramovic Institute
The action can be observed taking place in an enclosed room, through a wall of floor-to-ceiling glass windows. Opposite these windows is a wall, onto which a live video feed (of the same action) is projected. The live feed is from a camera, mounted on the back wall of the room, facing outward toward the glass. The camera feeds the projection its perspective: the action, and through the windows, the audience watching the action –or projection– and the projection itself, repeated like a hall of mirrors. The audience can look back and forth between the action and the projection, but not see both at once.
The following three actions took place over three days. The video pieces are exhibited as an unsychronized looping triptych.
BLACK/WHITE (GLUE), looping video (exhibited as triptych), 4:24:27, 2009
The room is white with a grey floor. I wear head to toe black latex. I paint the ceiling, walls, and floor black. I then cover the floor with a plastic tarp and take off the latex. I pour 5 gallons of Elmer’s glue over my head and stand facing the camera, waiting for it to dry. Once it dries, I peel the glue off of my body in one piece.
BLACK/WHITE (INK), looping video (exhibited as triptych), 3:25:52, 2009
The room is now black, floor to ceiling. I wear a white sweat-suit. I cover the ceiling, walls and floor with white butcher paper. I make a shallow plastic pool and fill it with black ink. I put up my hood and tie it so that my face is covered. I jump rope in the ink –splattering the papered room and myself– until there is no more left in the pool.
BLACK/WHITE (PLASTER), looping video (exhibited as triptych), 3:08:29, 2009
The paper is removed and once more the room is black, floor to ceiling. I mix 40 pounds of dry plaster with water. I pour the plaster into boxes and then put my feet in. When the plaster is dry, I remove the boxes and have plaster blocks on my feet. I paint the walls and ceiling white. Dragging my heavy plaster block-feet as I work makes a chalky drawing on the black floor. When I finish painting, I remove the blocks.