Allure of Sorts, sorted

Many many thanks to all the artists who performed with us! It was quite an exciting day and there were a lot of interesting reactions from the passers-by ranging from interference and popping a performer’s balloon to a security guard participating instead of moving us! There were a few last-minute changes, unfortunately, Katie Shevlin could not participate and a few locations changed on the fly, but all in all, it was a good day that ran fairly smoothly.
Every time one performs in a public space, the element of surprise is greater than in any gallery, just to state the obvious. You never know what the audience will do since many don’t expect or perceive art happening. A respond of confusion seemed prevailing, “what is this supposed to be?”, “Are they ok..?”. We had a documentor/assistant accompanying every artist and often the public deemed them to be the people to ask about these strange actions. They were told the title of the work, the name of the artist and the ethos of our public space performance festival, but we never explained the work. Most people were disappointed and would’ve wanted an explanation, a little blurb instructing on what to think about the work. We asked questions of what they thought and told them that we don’t believe in explaining art, telling people how to feel or think when faced with a strange thing, but encouraged them to trust their own fascinations, suspend disbelief and find the answers for themselves. There are no wrong answers and the intellectual, visual and emotional pleasure one gets from art is not dependent on the skill in art babble or a trained eye. Some people got quite upset for not receiving answers and felt tricked, where others were glad to gain the authority to think what they please.

The other side of our ethos was the questions around public space, who is allowed to use it and for what. UK is notorious for having a lot of private land amidst the city centers and most every where, spotted around the public parks and footpaths. In preparation to the event, we tried to get permits for every performance and in this mission, the biggest hurdle seemed to be the council on how to use public space; some areas of the city centre are not permitted for people to use for events like this, for security reasons. Piccadilly Gardens is heavily policed and so instead of art or citizens activities, the town centre is a place of surveillance. Other areas can only be booked if they are paid for and the smallest structure requires insurance which pricing starts at 1700£. Leafleting needs a printed materials distribution permit unless you are a charitable, political or a religious organization.
As you might have guessed, we did not get all our permits. Either because we could not pay for it or because we couldn’t find our way through the kafkaesque bureaucracy in time.
We informed all the artists of these rogue elements and for some, the day involved some negotiating with private security companies and the police. Everybody got to present their performances in full even though Kun Fang and Youngsook Choi had to move to a new location but in the case of Maria Orengo, the security guards took part in her performance by writing on a post-it note. Thank you for all our artists for being flexible and adventures! Based on our conversations in the evening’s shindig at the Soup Kitchen, the interactions with the public and even being moved seemed to add a lot to the work and was not entirely a bad thing when one is sensitive and quick to readjust the work based on the surrounding reactions. Less control, more improvisation. For many of the artists, this was their first time performing outside in the streets and happily, the experience seemed to get them curious for more.
The performances seemed to arouse the curiosity of locals if social media feeds can be taken as an indication; The most common question was simply, what is this? The most interesting comments and questions by far where the critical questions and views on the works. Personally, I would like to say a special thank you to Dave the Rave from Picadilly Rats, who with his friends who wanted to stay anonymous, posed the most challenging questions on Tim Knights piece “This home has a heartbeat”. It is vital for artists to consider the ethics of their work where the line between social commentary and raising awareness for social issues gets blurred by the risk of appropriating someone else’s struggle or advancing one’s own career by showing light on people in vulnerable positions. There are no easy answers when boundaries are searched and pushed. Homelessness is a massive issue not only in Manchester but in the whole UK, and as a squatter and as a part of Tape Moderns practicalities (functioning in occupied properties and public space), we touch on it very often. The right for housing, in our eyes, is a human right. I am grateful that the Market Street rough sleepers came to say their piece about how they viewed the art that directly commented on their precarious situations.

Once again, thank you to all our artists John Carney, Youngsook Choi, Claire Doyle, Kun Fang, Amy Guilfoyle, Tim Knight, Maria Orengo and Jade Williams. Thank you to all our volunteering squatters for legal aid and expertise in dealing with the autorities, thanks to all our documentors and thank you to the memberrs of the public who came to engage with the art and the artists.