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In the Language of Performance

Last week we watched an advanced form In the third space these forms are buried in the sand
of the work of Nikos Zouboulis and Titsa Grekou of the bottom beneath a membrane which suggests
as part of the Goethe Institut's program of modern a water surface, while all this material participates
music. As always, the performance by the two artists in the dramatic act, abiding by the discipline
included music as a major dynamic element, imposed by the sound of music.
composed by Gunther Becker. The clear references to ancient Greek culture are
The roots of performance go back to the early reflected in the shapes of the columns, the folds
20th century – long before Dada and its subversion formed on the fabric by the moving bodies,
of artistic disciplines – to 1913, when the Russian the slides from Delos, the symbolism of the glorious
cubists and futurists, Mayakovsky, Larionov, civilization that lies buried and the wish
Goncharova and Burliuk, magical names in Russian for – and acceptance of – (through the intensity
poetry and painting in the years of that great Spring of the music) a new era.
of the arts, paraded through the streets of Moscow We must say that the ambitious project by the two
with painted faces. In the 1920s Kurt Schwitters artists has arrived at a visual language capable
gave “lectures,” which escalated from mumbling of expressing fundamental concepts in a clear way.
to loud barks and the screeching of a siren. In comparison with earlier performances we have
In 1947 Artaud introduced the theatre of cruelty. seen, this time they expanded in space and added
"In the theatre, we do not play, we act. The theatre the images from color slides. The spectacle thus
is the genesis of creation." became more complex and acquired a more
Of course, starting in the Renaissance, artists were descriptive-analytical emphasis, rather than
the protagonists of public life, and the imaginative becoming simpler and more basic, as the work
events they organized were not all that far of the same artists attempted in the spring of 1980.
from today's performances. See for example Moreover, the three phases that open like theatre
the"Car of Death" presented by Piero di Cosimo stages in three different spaces and times confused
at the Florentine carnival of 1511. The early origins the viewers who could not follow everything at once
of all these contemporary ideas can be traced back – not a very happy situation in a performance whose
to primitive societies, to the very sources of art, functioning requires and encourages the viewers'
to religious and magical rites. attention and participation.
The work "Reciprocity III" by Zouboulis and Grekou
Beatrice Spiliadis
builds on the artists' views of time and history,
the concept of the everlasting and the changeable, Athens, 15 November 1982
the contrast between inactivity and action. Using as
main material their “trademark” elastic fabric [latex]
they form three distinct spaces that open up to the
audience at three different times. On this occasion,
music and lighting are aided by slides projected
on reliefs made with the elastic cloth using
the casting technique.
The forms of these reliefs capture one movement
of the live body behind the flexible material.