Distension | 2010

A room with three walls. One big wall in the rear and two smaller ones on each side. One hundred hooks fixed to these walls. In the middle of the biggest wall there is a tin with blue grease. On each side of the tin there are two ropes. Each rope measures 25m and is connected to 100 iron hooks. At the end of each rope there is a large gibbet knot. I start the performance entering the room barefooted, standing in front of the tin. I tie one of the gibbet knots to one of my feet and the other gibbet knot of the same rope at my wrist. I do the same with the other rope, whereas the ropes remain without crossing, connected to my body. I step with both feet into the tin with blue grease, walk out, get a hook of one of the ropes and fix it in one hook at the wall. I return to the tin, step into it with both feet, step out and get the hook of the other rope and fix it to the wall. I repeat this movement of fixing the ropes until I cannot move anymore and fall. I untie the gibbet ropes from my wrists and feet, ending the performance. 

In this work I focus back in the action as in my initial works. With it I aim to distend rather then to extend. At each of my movements, at each hook that I fix on the wall, my action connects me with the past delimiting the future. The more I act more difficult my action becomes. The more I move more limitations I create for myself. This is a work that is directly related to the being-able-to act, and to the knowing-how-to-act. What we know, how we know how to act and how we can act. It is also my first performance where philosophical studies invade the practical work.