| Work Type: | performance | | Work Sub Type: | sound/performance and video documentation | | Date of work: | 1999 | | Materials: | medium: 60 elderly men, 60 quartz rocks, video documentation
| | Subject: | performance, live-art, projection, event, elderly, men, sound, unity, quartz rock, rhythm, Australian outback, sparks, light, dawn, ritual, healing, spiritualist, autobiographical, common-ness, facuality, body, mind, political | | Technique: | 60 elderly men sit in a darkened room before dawn, stripped to the waist and, led by Parr, rhythmically clashing quartz rocks together and producing sparks in time with the music. The projection is videoed and shown as documentation work | | Collection: | Liverpool Biennial
| | | Description: | The third component, Water from the Mouth 3, is a live performance and subsequent projection of its documentation in Liverpool. In a dark room in the two hours before dawn 60 elderly men sit in rows stripped to the waist. Lead by Parr they rhythmically clash together 60 pairs of quartz rocks. The bright sound of these rocks from the Australian outback produces a mesmerising soundtrack. In time with these rhythms, sparks from the quartz intermittently light up the bodies of the men. These flashes of light herald the coming dawn, bridging night and day. Although this shared ritual of healing has a deep personal significance for the artist, whose work is strongly autobiographical, it is intended to address a common need. Parr has always been concerned to make his art 'factual' by systematically testing the limits of his own body and mind. In this way the personal is made to act as a marker of the political. [MORE][LESS]The third component, Water from the Mouth 3, is a live performance and subsequent projection of its documentation in Liverpool. In a dark room in the two hours before dawn 60 elderly men sit in rows stripped to the waist. Lead by Parr they rhythmically clash together 60 pairs of quartz rocks. The bright sound of these rocks from the Australian outback produces a mesmerising soundtrack. In time with these rhythms, sparks from the quartz intermittently light up the bodies of the men. These flashes of light herald the coming dawn, bridging night and day. Although this shared ritual of healing has a deep personal significance for the artist, whose work is strongly autobiographical, it is intended to address a common need. Parr has always been concerned to make his art 'factual' by systematically testing the limits of his own body and mind. In this way the personal is made to act as a marker of the political. | | | Source: | Trace, 1st Liverpool Biennial of Contemporary Art, Festival catalogue | | | Date of source: | 1999 | |
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