the slows
by ana luísa antunes & yann gibert
(Atelier OTIA TVTA, Lisbon, 16-12-09)
The Slows has been imagined by Ana Luísa Antunes and Yann Gibert as an answer to an invitation from Atelier OTIA TVTA, Lisbon.
A performance for a party.
By bringing back the demodé vocabulary of parties inside a party, Ana Luísa and Yann creates an anachronistic contribution to the receiving context of the performance: every hours, they are dancing a slow. Every hours, they interfere with the DJ's playlist, inserting a slow song in it, and dancing it.
This soft intervention on the collective hedonistic project contaminates the temporary community that has naturally been the audience of it first, then (while time passes and glasses are emptied) an accomplice, to finally become an actor of it too.The appropriation of the context by the performers leads to the appropriation of the performance by its audience.
This performance can be seen as a durational performance in its whole integration to its context (5 hours) or as a 25 min performance in its strict effectivity. The gap in between each slows allows the performers to integrate the event as one its casual actors, smoking, dancing, drinking, chatting with everyone around. This demystification of the artists open the possibility of a recognition from the audience, though the contemplation of the “dancers”, as him/herself dancing this way some years ago, and him/herself dancing this way in a possible immediate future.
