Marina Abramović: 512 Hours

Marina Abramović
512 Hours
Serpentine Gallery

I went to see Mariana at the Serpentina... and, I went to see Mariana at the Serpentina. 512 Hours by Marina Abramović, at the Serpentina, is a live tableau where the artist uses people instead of oil. A life size canvas in where the artist brings to life and wanders about bare life. A triptych about being! On the left panel we sit; on the central one we stand; while on the panel on the right we walk. (Other possible combinations might occur throughout time). The dynamics provoked by people being reminds me of a painters impression on the ink on the canvas, with it's particular texture, size, movement, pressure and different colours combining and relating with each other on a harmonious way.

No time devices, like watches, are allowed in the tableau. One has to become lost to time. So, definitively, this is not a surrealist painting. Take our own rhythm and slow down do the barest of it all. Just be being there: standing, walking, sitting, laying down, or counting seeds.

The audience participates in a performance about audience participation in the conception of the art work. However, the audience performative participation is, in contrary to previous performances delivered by the Serbian-born artist, more controlled by the artist and her "dwarfs". Although it requires a participation it is more like an authoritative state rather than a democratic one leading our decision on towards the outcome of the dynamics driving the conditions for the opening of possibilities.

Being it what it is, the need to be present as audience so the performance about audience participation occurs is a requirement. A necessity for the artist but not for the audience in itself. One is what one is without the need to have to go to mass concentration places to be what one is. Generalisations are good. But they are just that, generalisations. The particulars are what makes the being be, not the whole. As a part of a whole body - being audience - we, as individuals stop being a singularity, with our own voice, and have to follow the democratisation idea in where the majority has a ruling voice. However, in 512 Hours the ruling voice of the minority is the deciding voice just like in an democratic state... and, I should had gone directly to the closest sorority in town and have a truly audience participation and actively engage in a more penetrative way. I should had gone to a sorority and, instead, went to see Mariana at the Serpentina...

PS. The artist, as the author, is present all throughout the performative performance about audience participation.