Friday 13 May 2011

How I end capitalism in each of my works

In response to Douglas Leonard, (who doubts my force to end capitalism) http://www.realtimearts.net/article/issue101/10168

The end of capitalism is heralded by new developments in exchange and altruism. What Am
I doing for the revolution? I use touch to develop psychometry (as a new weapon of the love force revolution), exchange intellectual property as experience rather than object (to promote the immaterial) and make fun of capitalist ventures (like everyone else in contemporary art, ref: Carmen Ansaldo in Artlines April 2011)

1) The piece in question: "Love Hypnosis Exchange" (2011) Performance

keywords- gift economy, social interactions (For a nicer review of this performance)

I try to create an economy based on exchange of stickers, that I have provided, a trance like activity (regular measured spinning) is used to make the punter more disoriented with current modes of exchange and freer to exchange this new currency of stickers. This new temporal economy I have created is not just based on a
  • material exchange but also an exchange of:
  • creative expression as the punters deliberate which colour and where on the body they will place a sticker in each 8 second round
  • and also a social interaction, as the punter decides who they will place the sticker on
Touch, experience and parody to declare the end of capitalism. Giving a sticker to someone is a gift, an altruistic emotion conveyed by touch. Gift economies challenge current capitalist non-altruistic virtue. Whilst an experiential creation of art on other's bodies in exchange for the creation of art on your own body peddles ephemeral experience rather than object. Moreover the dizzying effects of the Wall St stock exchange are parodied and taken to a new mystical level by adding Sufi spinning to the equation.


2) Previous works: "$1 A Blow" Performance

Keywords: supply pricing experiment

We all have breath. Due to the tenet of supply pricing, I priced breath for as low as $1. But Nobody opted for just a breath on skin. In fact everyone opted for an option with added intellectual property. I told blow jokes, played songs with breath music apps on my iPhone, blew bubbles. People want experience more than the object. I add my voice to the contemporary art revolt, "we no longer care about beauty, we care about ironic political comment."

3) Previous works: "100 Fortune Cookies" (2010) Performance

Keywords: futures exchange, asia tiger economies

Dressed in my power suit and with the help of my tiger (economy), I offered Asian style futures. Willing participants had to hide a coin in the "sands of destiny" which were in fact the raw dry ingredients to make fortune cookies, after placing the coin, they could finger around in the sands and choose their fortune.

Again I am using touch, this time it's very sensual as people are touching these raw materials, which are often speculated in the "futures exchange." Punters are encouraged to use their psychometric powers to pick the fortune that is right for them. They receive the experience of search and find, and find a story for their future and dont actually get a cookie. Plus it's all dripping in irony with the costumes and word puns et al and the tiny joke that all the futures written were the same.

4) Previous works: "2010: The End of Capitalism" (2010) 25min video

Keywords: monumentality, post-modernity

An all out attack on monumentality of capitalism, portraits of artists working to "burst the bubble" of capitalism in Berlin. Only one artist chose psychometry to relate to the bubble in these expressionist experiences as these artists add their portrait to a declaration to end capitalism. Dramatic irony is kindly provided by a morphed soundtrack of Richard Wagner.

5) Remote Viewing Experiment (2009) 50min video

Keywords: psychometry, oneness

An experiment in psychometry. As artists are portrayed video journal style blindly trying to describe the room an object came from. All artists experienced a sense of "oneness" that flies in the face of the individual pursuit of capitalism.


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1 comment:

  1. RIP Douglas Leonard, Friday 9th December 2011. He will be dearly missed by many friends.

    ReplyDelete