The City “accommodates a diverse array of consumer performances, while the presence of non-consumer others […] is outlawed or more subtly policed” (Foust and Jones, 2008, 4). In the City, consumerism is considered a social normality and so non-consumers are perceived as the other who doesn’t belong. Walking through the City as a non-consumer is seen by the majority as interrupting the systematic flow of commercialism. The non-consumer cannot help but feel alienated due to the fact that the people around them are all abiding to the social normalities of City life. In this case, the “consumer subjects are “in place,” performing “properly,” and (for the most part) complementing, rather than interrupting, each other’s performances” (Foust and Jones, 2008, 9) and when the non-consumer does not perform according to these ideals, they are seen as a threat to the system. They threaten to disrupt the regulated structure of consumerism by challenging the ideology behind it. The City itself has the “potential to stage interruptions and challenges to consumerism” (Foust and Jones, 2008, 5) and by using separation as the distinction between consumer and non-consumer enables us as a society to take a closer look at the influence of commercialism. We want to give the public a chance to feel liberated from the constraints of consumerism by disrupting the ‘natural’ flow of modern City life, even if it is for a fleeting moment.

Looking at our performance from a political point of view, we are ultimately challenging the ethics of consumerism. To add to this political slant on our performance, it is election week so I’m sure our banners will not look too out of place, even though the content on the banners will be shockingly different. At first glance we may be perceived as supporters promoting a political party, however when the spectators realise that this is not the case, hopefully they will become more interested and may even feel a release of tension at our more innocent, simple gesture.

Banners are commonly used for advertisements and our ‘misuse’ of the banner, challenges the politics of consumerism because we are using the means of advertisement to offer something which has no price. We are making a stand against money making schemes by using the very means that support it. “Consumerism relies on a process of obsolescence and need/want manufacturing which creates a forever unstable and insatiable consumer-subject” (Foust and Jones, 2008, 8) For instance, occasions such as Valentine’s Day are overly advertised and the products sold are over-priced but we buy them anyway. This is because through advertising and marketing we are forced to believe that we ‘need’ these things. The things we do not need suddenly become ‘necessity’ and ‘essential’ to us due to the ideologies concerning commercialism that have been instilled in our minds.

Foust, C. and Jones, R. (2008) Staging and Enforcing Consumerism in the City: The Performance of Othering on the 16^th Street Mall. Liminalities: A Journal of Performance Studies, 4 (1) 1-28.

“Walkings are a series of excavations” (Crab Man and Signpost, 2011, 32) and each time we walk we discover new things and uncover new truths we didn’t notice before. No matter how many times you walk the same street, something will have changed. Walking can be seen as a means of liberation because we have the freedom to go where we please, in what manner we decide. For instance, the “twentieth century Situationists called ‘drifts or ‘derives’” (Crab Man and Signpost, 2011, 9) walk without destination. Walking aimlessly allows us to observe the things we see and even look more closely at the events unfolding around us. To walk without destination is to disrupt the everyday routine of life. The majority of people in the City always have somewhere to be and because of this, the flow of City life becomes fast-paced and continuous. The act of drifting, however, disrupts this flow and it is the drifter who is then seen as out of place and something to be gawked at, which in turn forces the majority to slow their pace, even if it is for a minimal amount of time.

When walking in the City, it is important to observe the way others walk and the direction they are walking in. In Pearson’s, Site Specific Performance, he lists the many types of walkers and he expresses that when walking, “architecture controls and limits physical movement and sight-lines; it can stage and frame those who inhabit its spaces” (Pearson, 2010, 21). Pearson emphasises how architecture itself places us in a space so that we can only see to a certain extent. Architecture obstructs our view from seeing into the distance and gaining the bigger picture of the City as a whole. Limiting the area of sight forces us to look at the surroundings which are closer to us, enabling us to engage on a more intimate level. With this in mind, for our performance, we will use proxemics to our advantage by positioning ourselves in the audiences line of sight by exploring the city and discovering the places where we are most likely to be seen.

Crab Man and Signpost (2011) A Sardine Street Box of Tricks. The Blurb.

Pearson, M. (2010) Site Specific Performance. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan

Gillian Wearing describes her work as “editing life” (Stonard, 2001). She documents the confessions of people through photography and film. The portraits she creates are very powerful to look at because these are pictures of real people and their own personal thoughts on public display. This photo of the policeman holding the ‘help’ sign really stood out to me because it can be interpreted in different ways. Is he expressing that he is here to help, or needs help? Or could he be asking us to help?

http://www.whitechapelgallery.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/GW_Image-01-e1416570167151-1170×655.jpg

http://www.whitechapelgallery.org/exhibitions/gillian-wearing/

Wearing’s work has inspired us to create something as bold and engaging. By using giant speech bubbles, we are creating visual spectacles that will really capture the public’s eye and draw their attention to us and what we are doing. The work we want to create is meant to be questioned in order to peek the members of the public’s curiosity. We want reactions, whether it is confusion, bewilderment, fascination, and even misunderstanding.

Wearing liberates the people she encounters by allowing them the freedom of speech in a safe, inviting environment. Of course, not everyone is willing to be a part of something like this, but when someone does engage and open themselves up to possibility, they are liberating themselves from the constraints of modern society. What I mean by this, is the fact that people choose to be silent and not express their feelings because it is safer, easier and not always socially accepted. In addition to this, the people who Wearing photographs are courageous enough to openly express their insecurities, anxieties and worries about their lives by letting down their metaphorical guards which have been built up to keep others out.

This example of creativity and bravery has inspired us to create our own work which defies social boundaries and liberates us and the public from social normalities. Our speech bubbles are designed to disrupt the public’s set journeys and to give them the opportunity of distraction by simply looking up. We tend to walk with our heads down in the literal and metaphorical sense and I believe we need to take the time to just ‘look up’.

Stonard, J. (2001) Gillian Wearing OBE. [online] New York: Tate. Available from: http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/gillian-wearing-obe-2648 [Accessed 25 February 2015].

In the city “we are surrounded by buildings to which access is restricted or denied to us because of our status, because our actions may be against the common good” (Pearson, 2010, 97). In this sense, we are denied the freedom to go where we please because of our position in society. We are being forced to abide by strict social rules and if we were to stray beyond these social barriers, we would be made to feel as if we didn’t belong.

However, Pearson also states that “in the city we can be anonymous. This perhaps increases our freedom of action” (Pearson, 2010, 97). The City itself is a means of liberation. Everyone and anyone has the right to walk the city streets and pursue whichever path they choose. In the City we have the freedom of movement, but to what extent? It can also be asked that, is being anonymous the only way in which we can feel free in the city? What if we were to stand out? Does this not liberate us from being stuck in the crowd? Our aim is to stand out and be seen when creating performance, not only to liberate ourselves by doing something different and unusual but to liberate people from dominant ideologies of social normalities and regulations.

“In public, we may require a kind of physical restraint, a kind of decorum that allows the mass to function” (Pearson, 2010, 98). In this sense, we take on a kind of persona that allows us to blend in with the crowd in order to get on uninterrupted with our everyday activities. We hardly question the ideologies behind our behaviour in public social spheres which is why we want to create a performance that will stand out and challenge these ideologies.

Pearson, M. (2010) Site Specific Performance. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan

In Govan’s Routes and Roots, Dudley Cocke describes how the Roadside Company engages their audience by “sharing and celebrating local music, and narratives of place often provided the starting point for devising a performance” (Govan, 2007, 137) and how this successfully engages “local audiences in performance-making” (Govan, 2007, 137). Therefore, by giving the audience something they can relate to and understand ultimately allows them to feel comfortable and more willing to participate in the performance. This is something important to think about when developing our own pieces of site specific performance.

Another important aspect to consider when approaching site specific performance is the historical background of a place. To fully understand the place in contemporary life, we need to research the historical aspects of the place. Marvin Carlson theorises that “places of public performance […] are marked by the traces of their other purposes and haunted by the ghosts of those who have used them in the past” (Govan, 2007, 139). By discovering the original ‘roots’ of a place, we are able to imagine the place as it once stood and in doing so, we have the advantage of re-creating or re-experiencing the past and merging it with the present. Pearson and Shanks elaborate on Carson’s theory with their own notion of “the host and the ghost” (Govan, 2007, 139) which they describe as “a negotiation between the contemporary and the historical in which ‘no single story is being told’”. (Govan, 2007, 139). Pearson and Shanks emphasise the importance of the past in relation to the present and how we go about performance-making with this in mind. This suggests that residual energy lies within each space and it is this same energy that gives the space meaning. For instance, a battlefield before the battle would have merely been a field.

Govan, (2007). Between Routes and Roots. Performance, Place and Diaspora. 136-143.