Throughout the month of January, Links Hall provides a multitude of performances including readings, translation, multimedia, and performance art for the January 2009 festival. The project is titled, “When Does It or You Begin? (Memory as Innovation.)” Amina Cain and Jennifer Karmin curated it. There are four individual projects with interchanging artists for each project each night.
I went to see “Collective Memory: Collaboration is Group Work” on Jan. 18. When I first heard the title, I thought, “Hmm. Interesting.” It was queer to hear, since I have to recite a presentation about memory in my psychology class. I knew it wasn’t coincidence. It was something I had to watch.
The first section entailed three separate monologues read at the same time.
Talk about disordered psychosis. I tried to focus on one, but was tossed into another like a newborn infant coming from the womb to the doctor to the sink to the mom to the hospital crib. Maybe it was their intention of representing the chaos within our minds. It’s one of those things where when you close your ears, the voices will still be there.
Yes, and they were still ringing into the next performance.
The next act was tremendously more viable to listen to, however, I couldn’t focus on the words that were coming out of their mouths. Those damn bells! It was written and spoken by Dolores Dorantes and translated and spoken by Jen Hofer.
My friend recalled to me a phrase, “People’s souls are waiting to die, and the assassin watches over them.” Nice, but it’s a pity I couldn’t recall anything.
I thoroughly enjoyed the video developed by Laurie Jo Reynolds titled, “Space Ghost.” Imagine half a pear in conjunction with a half of broccoli. They are inevitably separate, but one can find the relation. “Space Ghost” was just that, except the binary incorporated the duality of prisoners and astronauts.
Additionally, there was audio between a prisoner and a friend. Their conversation was at times comical, yet endearing. However, the screen portrayed a sense of isolation and loneliness one endures within the two locations.
If one is not an expert, then one does not know about space or prison. I believe the creator was implying the ignorance of the people in which prisons are not always violent and the space is not always satisfying as they are both portrayed. Now it’s stored in our itty-bitty fractions of our brain chips. Delicious.
And the final piece was performance art at its not so greatest.
It’s winter now, and the squirrel has yet to find any nuts. I actually saw a squirrel the other day, and I felt sorry for it.
Where was the prize that I desired but did not find?
It was wind-up radios, hanging or folding shadows, pointing flashlights at each other’s crotches and dancing in high heels and boots. What a grand prize that was.
All in all, it wasn’t a horrific dumbed-down experience, but I expected more about organized innovation as they claimed. Some pieces may be worth the extra memory storage, but forget about the rest.