One of the new generation of artists performing at the MAI Takeover is Cassils, a transgender artist who uses the material of their body to explore the physical fluidity of gender. Their performance, Tiresias, sees them melt neoclassical Greek male torsos carved out of ice with their body heat. Asked about the role of danger in performance art, Cassils tells BBC Culture that it is a misconception that performance must involve physical risk. “I conduct research, consult with experts and undergo training regimes to understand the limitations of my body,” they say. “My practice is about fostering a deep somatic connection so that I may respect, deepen and care for my vessel. As we are in an increased time of oppression and violence this attunement is paramount.”
Why she’s still causing a storm
This seems to be in tune with the turn that Abramović has taken in her own works, that there are forms of response and meditation in performance art beyond sharp shocks. That is not to say that the art should not be controversial. In 1977, Abramović and her partner Ulay stood naked in a narrow doorway to become the entrance to the Galleria Comunale d’Arte Moderna, Bologna. The text next to them read: “Imponderable. Such imponderable human factors as one’s aesthetic sensitivity. The overriding importance of imponderables determining human conduct.” Entitled Imponderabilia, the piece forced the visitor to make countless decisions about how to navigate this socially undesirable situation to which there can be no right answer. The piece has been restaged at the RA, with a pair of nude performers replacing Abramović and Ulay, and almost as many protocols as there are imponderables, including security guards, restrictions on photography, psychiatric support for the artists, and so on.
Yet despite the protective measures in place, Imponderabilia has once again caused a storm. “The British audience is so puritan,” Abramović says, responding to the controversy of having real nude figures in the exhibition. “It’s so interesting that it is the same question I have been asked over and over again after 55 years of my career. Why is this art, and why is there nudity? I will never get used to it.” She is pleased at least that nobody is indifferent, and that it prompts so many responses in people who experience it. “I have always said that the public complete the work. You should never say everything.” It seems that after Abramović and the first generation of performance artists broke the rules and taboos of the art world in the 1970s, they have been rebuilt with more resolute prudishness.
It is also true that long durational performance art has largely vanished from public gallery spaces, at least in the UK. The MAI Takeover at the Southbank Centre, filling the spaces of the Queen Elizabeth Hall, including changing rooms, courtyards, and underground spaces usually closed off to the public, will be a totally new experience for a younger generation of visitors. Brazilian artist Paula Garcia tells BBC Culture that this is why a sense of danger and unpredictability still has a vital place in performance. “They both trigger a change of state,” she says, “It is as if the body, at that moment in action, manages to break out of inertia.”
