KOLLEKTIVNYE DEYSTVIYA (COLLECTIVE ACTIONS). THE DESCRIPTIONS OF ALL THE ACTIONS, Photo and Video
JOURNEYS TO THE COUNTRYSIDE. VOLUME THIRTEEN
143. Banner-2016 with a Louse stitched on and Warhol
On a boardwalk on the territory of the Losiny island by the Yauza, in parallel to the boards and between the handrails, a purple banner sheet (10 m x 1 m) with the numbers of the Actions of CA carried out in this area from 1981 (see map here; the boardwalk is where Action no. 125 was carried out), was stretched with the obverse side up. Among the circles with digits a circle of the same size with the depiction of an elephant louse was stitched on, and in the middle on the sheet was a photograph of the Action of CA "Stop" 1983 (viewers, walking along the Sokolniki alley, photographed from above).
On the handrails at both ends of the sheet attached in this way a pair of scissors was placed (so that if a passersby – an anonymous viewer of the Action – wanted to use the boardwalk and walk across, he could cut the ropes or the fabric of the banner herewith freeing his passage).
After the banner was mounted, from AM's briefcase an object was taken out, which was a white bust of Mao Zedong (which was used in the Action "The Removal of the Red Binding", no. 132) with a small radio attached to his back with coloured elastic bands, in the form of a schoolbag-rucksack – it was switched on transmitting noise wave.
Having walked with this resounding object (S. Romashko was carrying it in his hands) 100 metres away from the boardwalk up to the small hill on the west (the place where the trial Action "Dark place" – no. 25 in 1981 was carried out), N. Panitkov coloured Mao Zedong's face with a bright yellow marker.
Subsequently, the whole group of participants (AM was carrying the resounding bust of Mao with the radio in his left hand high above his head) walked along the Yauza to the west approximately until that place, where to the left side of the river and on the opposite side of the little forest was the banner, and got ready for the group photograph on the paled square platform hovering above the water.
As the photographing was taking place, standing with his back to the river among the group and holding the resounding object in front of him, AM suddenly threw it over his head into the water (this episode of the Action was not discussed with the co-authors of the Action and was unexpected for all the participants). With the splash of the falling object into the water the constant ding-dong sound, which was emitting from the radio all the way from the banner up to the river, ceased, and in this emerged silence AM distributed factography to the viewers-participants – two small laminates: photographs with Warhol's picture, depicting Mao with a coloured face, and on the other side the photo object "Mao with the radio"; the second laminate is the map of the place of Action taken from outer space with a collaged head of Mao and an elephant louse.
(After the Action the participants made their way to IM and EE's studio, where on the occasion of CA's 40th jubilee a small exhibition was shown, consisting of a A0 sheet of a 1987 project of the unrealised Action "Group", three varied size sheets of projects of the unrealised Action from 1985 "I. Makarevich's report", and a A0 sheet of AM's work "The Action STOP we did on February 6 1983..." See photographs here.)
March 15, 2016
Losiny island, along Yauza
A. Monastyrski, N. Panitkov, M. Sumina, S. Romashko, S. Hänsgen, E. Elagina, D. Novgorodova, I. Makarevich
Action viewers: V. Sorokin, I. Sorokina, A. Kuzkin, M. Leykin, M. Konstantinova, A. Malyshkin, S. Sitar, O. Sarkisyan, O. Kroytor, L. Romanova, A. Atik, V. Osipov.
(+ N. Alexeev, A. Obukhova, I. Nakhova, I. Backstein in IM and EE's studio).
(Translated by Marina Gerber)
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