We cancel because we feel censored
We cancel because we feel disrespected
We cancel because the process has been colonizing, in the framework of a supposedly decolonial exhibition
We cancel because they asked us for a plan B
We cancel because we never have a plan B
We cancel because the work is just like life
We cancel our practices pass through us like ancestral poems
We cancel because we do not share rhythms, times, or neoliberal practices
We cancel because we do not understand art, nor life, as that which does not feel, nor suffers and gives up.
We cancel because we do not share chores if they are not collectively, with complicity and with affections that affect the imposed structures.
We cancel because we know and believe that there are other ways to do things.
We cancel because we are not merchandise
We cancel because we are not a pack
We cancel because the emotional, the spiritual, life passes through us.
We cancel because we advocate for art spaces that are places to create and grow together.
We cancel because we feel censored

 

We have been working on a new performance work for several months following the invitation of Lis Costa and Josep Ma. Jordana (Habitual Video Team) as part of the shared curatorship of the exhibition “The Possibility of Not Having Been Seven Decolonial Interferences” at the center d’arts santa mònica de Barcelona.

The work consists of having an artist suspended with a network of ropes attached to a structure. This artist would be bleeding. Her blood would fall on the naked back of the other artist who would be tied face down, receiving these drops of blood on the word colony that she has tattooed on her back. Eventually the ropes that bind the artist are burned (by means of lit candles); She sits up and collects the blood from it. This blood goes through an alchemical process of various chemical components that alter its thickness and color. With this mixture, the walls of the institution are painted with symbols of the Taíno culture (the first people from Abya Yala to be kidnapped to be shown, dehumanized and exoticized in Europe, were Taínos).

Throughout this process we have established complicities with experts and technicians in body suspension, we have the support and supervision of a nurse, advice and support from a UPC professor, with a team dedicated to the design of structures to perform aerial arts, as well as with archaeologists from the University of Puerto Rico.

In the first meeting, which was with those in charge of technical direction and coordination of the center’s activities, when we explained the technical aspects to be resolved, we were asked directly if we had a plan B.
What does it mean to have a plan B in the artistic framework? Are they restricting us? Are they censoring us?
This lack of respect, tact and professionalism left us touched, affected, violated…

There is, in the proposed piece, an obvious physical risk but also other more subtle or less obvious physical and non-physical risks. However, this does not mean that a plan B has to be considered, but on the contrary, there must be greater support to create the work with all the pertinent care. For us, the greatest risk is that an institution presents an exhibition on decoloniality and pretends that there is no danger in any of the proposals to be exhibited.
The supposed fear (or perhaps reluctance), the lack of professionalism, the lack of empathy, respect and the established dynamics of power and control games were what made it possible for the institution to propose presenting a plan B (that is, another construction site).

After this meeting, the experience becomes complicated. We are informed that the Santa Monica center is not prepared at a technical level, nor in logistical, human, or material resources to carry out the proposed piece and that therefore it cannot count on any type of production support beyond a sound system and a lighting system. What we are faced with is taking charge, on our part, of searching for and solving the technical aspects to develop the piece. They set two conditions: the first is that they are not going to increase the production budget item, therefore, the rental of specific structures and materials, services to third parties derived from the assembly, production and execution of the work will be charged to the allocated item. to our fees, already quite precarious. The second condition is that in three days, we had to present a dossier with a detailed list of the specific structural elements and safety measures applied and approved to later be approved, or not, by the person responsible for Occupational Risks of the ICEC.

What does this new direction mean in reality – trying to reduce the budget (or not increase it) and have it spent on things that already exist, are and can be used in the same institution? Now the work cannot be done due to lack of budget? Will the responsibility of presenting, or not, the artwork fall to someone external to the artistic institution, the person responsible for occupational risks? What does it mean to want a performance work to pass the filter of an occupational risk manager? Is there any performance that passes the test?

 

Recount of the facts

First step:
Plan B
Second step:
You cannot use any material or logistical resources of the center.
Third step:
If you need any material or logistical resources, they have to be rented, but for this I do not increase the budget, therefore you pay for it.
Fourth step:
Any material or resource rented from outside the center must go through the approval of the Occupational Risk committee, which may or may not approve it.
Fifth step:
We proposed to do a ritual
Sixth step:
Administrative silence
Seventh step:
Together with the curator we requested an urgent meeting with the director of the center.

 

The three of us met with the director of the center. We explained what we had experienced and received an apology and a reiteration that the institution did not intend to censor us but that it was a reaction based on fear, incompetence, lack of empathy and professionalism and many other shortcomings on the part of the team in response to our proposal. We are told that surely we are not going to get paid. If nothing is presented, there is no charge. He tells us that it is not in his power to reverse this way of doing things.

Isn’t the creative process work? Is the pre-production of a work not work? Aren’t all the money, time and resources that we have already spent part of the approved and agreed budget item?

 

For all this, on Thursday, December 14, 2023, we cancel the performance. We are not going to be part of an exhibition about decolonialism where the dynamics and practices of the space where it is held are colonial.

 

Marina Barsy Janer x Isil Sol Vil
www.marinaxisil.art