A 4-hour-long durational performance.
Balance requires physical coordination, mental concentration, calm, and a sense of humor. Balance is on the brink of collapse in every direction. In this solo performance, Merritt Johnson focuses on the act of balancing, and on acting balanced. Using increasingly ridiculous physical action and exhaustive duration, Balancing Act embraces the awkwardness, tension and humor found in balancing: cultures, art, survival, family, form, function, physical and mental fitness.
In the four-hour performance, Johnson will balance on the books: Art History by Marilyn Stokstad (Instructor Review copy), The Art of Color by Johannes Itten, The Beast And the Sovereign by Jacques Derrida, Power/Knowledge by Michel Foucault and Who Sings the Nation State by Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak and Judith Butler. The books underfoot are alternately read aloud and balanced on the artist’s head as she simultaneously attempts to balance silver juice pouches, gold leafed plaster casts of applesauce cups, a bag of beads and a turkey feather.
New York City, NY; NYC