KatharineDwyer
'Report to the Committee'
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1. Introduction In this performance:
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a verbal report is presented to a committee meeting, giving various factual and numerical details, some of which are contradictory
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a pecha kucha slideshow of unrelated images plays alongside, detailing various research interests at that time.
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the tone is authoritative, competent but impersonal, and the images are dystopian in mood
Subverting the corporate form
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If an audience is presented with conflicting channels of information, where do they pay attention?
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How do form and content interact?
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How do sincerity and authority interact for an audience?
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How far does suspension of disbelief go?
1.1 Live performance
The rhetoric of power and authority
In this work I acknowledged that my interest in the communication of power and authority came from my corporate experience.
I explicitly placed myself at the centre of my work, and considered the implications of a new context for my existing managerial skillset.
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Outcome
I learned that my presence had an unanticipated authority.
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Language became a medium, taking precedence over the content. Cadence, tone, body language, and vocabulary obscured the message of the words spoken.
'Report to the Committee' (2015) Digital film 3m 32s
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Performative, not performance
I considered this to be only a part performance: the corporate persona is one version of the self I can choose to present to the world.
2. 'The Project' - a performance in two parts
2.1 Part I
Continuing the same presentation and powerpoint format, I performed in front of a new audience to test how far content can be overridden by form?
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Slides with quasi-corporate diagrams flash up. They bombard without communicating, slowly gathering momentum.
The presentation by a shadowy figure reassures in its tone and style, yet imparts only fragments of information. What should the audience already know?
'The Project' (2016) Documentation of performance Digital video excerpt 1m 03s
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3.2 Reflection
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The written questionnaire lacks subtlety, but:
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When delivered sincerely one to one, few people break with the interview format once started.
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The context of library (vs street) likely contributed as a trusted public space.
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People genuinely want to help.
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It is frightening to realise one’s own power to persuade.
The experiment was around the tolerance of the audience for a series of peculiar questions from seemingly legitimate pollsters. No identity data (name, DOB, etc) was requested, but some questions were personal:
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What is your inside leg measurement?’
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‘Do you have any food allergies we should be aware of?’
This questionnaire was delivered face to face. In this more intimate one on one situation would subverting authority still work?
3. The Artistic Agency of the Paperwork Executive (TAAPE)
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3.1 Overview
As part of the PARK16 exhibition in Wimbledon, the public library was patrolled by volunteers in oversize blue vests holding clipboards. Visitors were asked for responses to a questionnaire on the art exhibition taking place.
Rebellion
Pilvi Takala conducts a month long internship as The Trainee. The film documents how she does nothing constructive, and the confusion of her new colleagues at her refusal to hide this peculiar behaviour.
Mood and Costume
In Terry Gilliam’s Brazil the various bureaucratic departments are frenetic with useless activity and acronyms.
Staff wear exaggerated costumes: oversized coats and padded shoulders emphasize how their world depends on keeping up appearances.
3.3 Context:
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Authority and Obedience
The Milgram experiment (1962) tested the willingness of volunteers to give electric shocks to poorly performing test subjects (actors) if told to do so by more senior colleagues.
Unexpectedly the study found a high proportion (some 65%) of volunteers were willing to obey orders, albeit unwillingly, even if there was a risk of injury or death to a test subject.
The Stanford Prison experiment (1971) was halted after 6 days when groups of student volunteers dubbed ‘prisoners’ became depressed, and their ‘guards’ became sadistic.
'TAAPE' (2016) Performers on site
1.2 Recorded Performance
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In using film for the first time to document my work, I considered what this medium could add to the original performance.
In a live situation the audience was confronted with two conflicting channels of information. The screen unifies these into one object, lessening their the confusion.
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To reintroduce that I experimented with:
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using editing techniques as Brechtian alienation devices.
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jump cuts
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mismatching the timing of speech and visuals of those words being spoken
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silence, where the only communication is via body language
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curating the presentation of the film to include props from the set
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After reflecting on this work I conducted further performance experiments, as detailed below in 'Other works.'
'Report to the Committee' Installation view
Hito Steyerl's performance lectures (Is the Museum a Battlefield) begin with a seemingly straightfoward logic yet then pivot the narrative to disorient and take the audience to unexpected places.
Australians for Coal subverts a glossy corporate form by using unexpected language to powerful effect.
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Carey Young explores the intersection between corporate or legal structures and the world beyond, using known structures to highlight
absurdities in the application of bureaucracy.
1.3 Context:
Patrick Goddard's Greater Fool Theory purports to be an interview with an old school friend working in the City of London, but is actually scripted and acted.
2.2 Part II
The second part of the presentation combines elements into a set of readings to the audience, remniscent of a religious setting.
Form
Appropriating Amy Cuddy's TED talk on power poses. How do unexpected or extreme movements affect an audience?
Content
Reading Weber "The Protestant ethic and the spirit of capitalism", and considering the quasi-religious undertones to the view of work in our modern society. Why do we work?
Also, reconsidering some popular business texts. Classically cited as essential reading for new recruits are
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Sun Tzu's The Art of War
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Machiavelli’s The Prince.
Strikingly confrontational, these frame corporate life as a battle to be won. With the idea that you as an employee must adapt to survive, as in Johnson's 'Who moved my cheese?'
'The Project' (2016) Documentation of performance Digital video excerpt 3m 38s
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Other Works
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