We wake up soon

“It ain’t over until it’s over #8”
Görlitz, Germany 2021
Stre!fen Performance Art Festival
Invited by Stre!fen e.V.
Duration: 24 minutes
Photographs by Monika Deimling

“A restaurant at the edge of the universe.”

Context:

The performance was presented as part of the Stre!fen Performance Art Festival 2021 in Görlitz, serving as the opening act of the exhibition ZUKUNSTSVISION.

Stre!fen is an annual festival dedicated to contemporary performance art, creating a space for experimentation, dialogue, and cross-disciplinary exchange. Known for its site-responsive approach, the festival brings performances into unexpected urban and natural landscapes, challenging conventional notions of artistic presentation and audience engagement.

The exhibition took place in an industrial area, far from the city centre. To reach the exhibition space, visitors had to walk along a long concrete wall covered in graffiti. To mark the location of the performance, I wallpapered a significant section of this wall. The aged wallpaper lent the site a homely charm, allowing me to integrate the other materials for the performance seamlessly.

Description of actions:
A collage of performance images and sounds is created by executing the following actions with selected material.

– Sitting on a chair at a table, which is in front of a wall covered with wallpaper.
– Lightning wood wool, which is placed on a white plate on the table.
– Hitting on the table with both fists to the left and right of the plate. [The sound of the beating can be heard clearly.]
– Sitting on the table, painting the toes red. [White smoke rises from the plate.]
– Putting a lampshade on the head and dancing softly.
– Burning the word “DREAM” of the phrase “THIS IS JUST A DREAM” attached to the wallpaper. [The brown cardboard letter burns and partially ignites a piece of the wallpaper.]
– Standing on the table and moving the chair around it. [This is done with a guiding cross attached to the chair with strings; The wallpaper is still burning and glowing.]
– Sitting on the chair, moving slowly a violin bow across the face and spreading dots of red paint.
– Placing brown cardboard letters on the table forming the phrase “WE WILL WAKE UP SOON”; Tilting the table so the phrase is readable to all.
– Throwing the plate onto the burnt word “Dream”.
– Lighting a blue and a white smoke torch attached to a picture frame hanging on the wall. [Blue and white smoke rises and extends the blue of the painting in the frame.]
– Climbing up the wall using a rope hanging from a fence above.
– Standing at the top, tying a large eye in front of my face, throwing several ping-pong balls at the eye. [The white balls bounce off the eye jump into the audience and scatter on the ground.]
– Slowly walking backward until the body is no longer visible to the audience.