Collected Tales of Mi(s)s(ed)Fortune

2012

performance

This project was produced for Nomad Advocacy event in Skopje in the autumn of 2012. The event was supposed to bring together dance and performance artists from the Balkan region and representatives from various regional funding bodies in order to discuss the state of the arts in the Balkans. 

My aim was not to make yet another art piece, but rather to make a work of art that would really fit and add to the topics of the panelled discussions, i.e. to address the work and living condition in the arts in a way to make representatives of the funding bodies think with or as the artist. 

The result was a book presentation of my own poetry collection (Collected Tales of Mi(s)s(ed)Fortune), in which I invited 3 members of the audience to role-play me, the author of the book (I was especially aiming to invite on stage the representatives of the funding bodies), while I, the actual artist, took over the role of the moderator and steered the discussion of the Q&A. The role of the moderator enabled me to curate the spontaneous happening on stage and help the role-players playfully construct the identity of the artist, present her poetry and talk about the work and living conditions in the world of literature.

In the finishing act of the performance the book presentation evolves according to its usual protocol, and the 3 role-players proceed to book signing and chatting to the public, an act that symbolically robs me of authorship of my own work.

Format used: book presentation

Element of disturbance/subversion: replacing me, the artist, with 3 members of the audience

Method: pre-prepared and instant curating, role-play

Key topics discussed: production and living  conditions in the arts, authorship, value of art