VIDEO: Marina Abramović & Ulay-On Performance and Reperformance
Marina Abramović and Ulay reflect on the practical aspects and challenges of re-performing their iconic works, shedding light on the evolving landscape of performance art. Among the things they discuss are the resurrection of performance art and the concept of re-performing past pieces.
When confronted with the question of who could effectively re-perform their pieces, Ulay initially rejected the idea of re-performing his pieces. He recalls: “At one stage, you called me, and you said, ‘Listen, I want to re-perform three or four of our former pieces, which can be you?’ Do you remember what I said? ’Me, I would have done it. I would have done it without restrictions or regret.’ And then you said, ’No, no, no, no.’”
Despite Ulay’s reservations, Marina Abramović and Ulay’s performance pieces have been re-performed in several institutions, including MoMA in New York and the Louisiana Museum in Denmark.
Reflecting on the live-ness as the core of performance art, Marina Abramović makes a statement about how the performer heavily influences the piece: “Re -performance is like performing a good Bach: you can have a lousy guy who performs a Bach that is so terrible, you just want to sleep, or you can have an amazing charismatic performer who gives you something new because he’s giving his own input into this work. It’s the same with young performers. They have to be trained, they have to be handled well, and when they really perform, if they have this charisma, it’s a transformative experience.”
The video is an excerpt from the Louisiana Channel documentary ‘No Predicted End.’
Ulay (Frank Uwe Laysiepen, b.1943 – d.2020) was a German artist based in Amsterdam, Holland, and Ljubljana, Slovenia. Ulay received international recognition for his work as a photographer, mainly in Polaroid, from the late 1960s, and later as a performance artist, including his collaborative performances with Marina Abramović from 1976 to 1988. His work has continuously dealt with politics, identity, and gender. In 2016 Schirn Kunsthalle in Frankfurt, Germany, held the first major retrospective show of his work ‘Ulay Life-Sized.’ In 2020 the Stedelijk Museum held the largest-ever and first international post-humous retrospective exhibition of his work ‘Ulay Was Here.’
Marina Abramović (b. 1946) was born in Belgrade, former Yugoslavia, and is now based in New York. She began her work as a performance artist in the early 1970s and is now regarded as one of the most essential artists in the field. Her work explores the relationship between the performer and audience, the limits of the body, and the possibilities of the mind. Her retrospective ‘The Artist is Present’ at MoMA, New York, in 2010 gave her a wide international breakthrough. In 2017 the retrospective exhibition ‘The Cleaner’ was shown at Moderna Museet in Stockholm and the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Humlebæk, Denmark, among other places in Europe. Marina Abramović is set to have a major exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts, the first-ever UK exhibition spanning her life’s work.
Marina Abramović and Ulay were interviewed by Kasper Bech Dyg in upstate New York at Marina Abramović’s home over ten days in August 2018 for the film ‘No Predicted End’, Directed, edited, and produced by Kasper Bech Dyg, Camera: Jakob Solbakken, Additional Camera: Kasper Bech Dyg, Music: Simon Dokkedal Sound, Mix: Torsten Larsen, Colour Grading: Klaus Elmer, Graphic Design: Louisiana Design Studio, © Louisiana Channel, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, 2022 Louisiana Channel is supported by Den A.P. Møllerske Støttefond, Ny Carlsbergfondet, C.L. Davids Fond og Samling and Fritz Hansen