Gallery Series #3 - (Present Utopia) Helsinki, Finland

Present "Utopia", the third of the gallery series, was presented on the opening night of the group show R4pp4cc1n1’5 D4ugh73r, shown at Helsinki's Sorbus gallery. Curated by Sorbus and Jaakko Pallasvuo, the show included work by Katja Novitskova, Maya Ben David, Ville Kallio, Salla Tykkä, and Bora Akinciturk, as well as a guided meditation to close the exhibition by Emmi Venna. The show started in the gallery and then brought the audience up and down the street. During one point in the performance a man leaned out his window and shouted in Finnish: "Who the fuck is that dude and why are you all following him?" (a valid question imo.)

The score for Present "Utopia" came after spending time during the buildup of R4pp4cc1n1’5 D4ugh73r with the artists, artworks and curators, who all seemed to be dealing with transhumanism in one way or another. I then took ideas and images from this transhumanist thinking (body-hacking, virtual-realities, digital-intoxications etc.) and set it to contrast it with the sidewalk, buildings and bars up and down Vaasankatu street, thus letting the exhibition “spill out” out of the gallery. In the days following the performance, I was invited by artist and film-maker Jaakko Pallasvuo (also known as avocado_ibuprofene) to perform in a short film called You Are The Sun, which was filmed in the neighbourhood of Kallio.

Gallery Series #2 - (Public Utopia) Geneva, Switzerland

During the first warm days of Spring 2017, I was invited by friend and colleague Gitte Hendrikx to perform at the opening of a small exhibition at KiosK, which, as the name suggests, was an empty newspaper stand on Place des Augustins in Geneva. I was immediately fascinated by the square, which served as a platform for a multitude of purposes: shady tress, benches for rest and leisure, public restrooms, a bronze sculpture for contemplation, a perfectly circular flower bed, panels for posting military information, and even a structure that fed and sterilised(!) pigeons.

Because the exhibition in Kiosk was more or less in the center of the square, I took it upon myself to turn the entire Place des Augustins into the performance space, and to perform a score that acknowledged other elements on the square. The sculpture became the memory of artists past, the ring-shaped flower bed a representation of the world that keeps on spinning, the bench as a public place for tears to flow. That same evening the space behind KiosK was used to sing songs as Zachary Airhorn.

(Photos by Matheline Marmy)

Gallery Series #1 - (Private Utopia) Brussels, Belgium

The first performance of the Gallery Series was done during a small performance event organised by artist, musician and herbalist Stéphanie Vérin. Named Festival Poisson-Évêque, the three day event took place in April of 2017 in a free access gallery space called Le Maga, as well as in surrounding streets, apartments and even during nocturnal tours of the city. Created in collaboration with Stephane Blumenschein, the performance told the story of someone who is in between two countries, whether be it culturally, historically or even through travel. Stephane created 3 sculptures for the exhibition out of wood and laser beams, which functioned both as stages for the performance and a reminder of distance traveled through space.

After beginning on an extremely small stage/sculpture, the performance then exited the gallery to go up Avenue Jean Volders towards the Parvis de St-Gilles, bringing the audience inside a small restaurant called Snack Atlas (since simply renamed to l’Atlas). Inside the establishment, an original song was sung and containers of ayran distributed to the audience. The performance then returned to the gallery and concluded on another “stage” by Stephane, where a third sneaker was present. It must be noted that during the multiple times the show was done, some audience members did not remain present throughout the show, preferring to stay at the snackbar to order food.

(video recording by Otto Byström / sound recording by Aurèle His Belliard / photos by Ludovic Beillard)