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Opposite top: Still from That Apart, two-channel
HD video projection, 2019, courtesy the artists. Sandra Johnston/ Richard Ashrowan Opposite below: Commissioned and produced by Project Arts Centre, Dublin with support from the Irish Museum of Modern Art Production Residency and Arts Department, Northumbria University, Newcastle Upon Tyne, UK. This page: Still from Overprint Alternating two-channel video projection, colour, sound, 2019 Courtesy the artist Sandra Johnston. Two videos from the UTV (Ulster Television) news archives documenting the Peace People organisation through two peace marches that took place across Britain and Ireland in 1976 as this grass-roots organisation gained international attention, including two of its leaders Betty Williams and Mairead Maguire being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. agency of artistic and curatorial work in relation to economic, social, and political institutions and power, the status of exhibitions and the role of public institutions.” When she approached Johnson to develop Wait it Out is now running in the gallery of the Project Arts Centre until Saturday October 19 (11am-7pm). tense to process her memory, working with Ashrowan to film hours of footage that combine new material, whilst revisiting movements from previous performances and materials that felt unfinished. “When working to a camera you have the time to repeat until the movement is exhausted… not just physically exhausted but haptic, until the meaning no longer resonates.” For a performance artist Johnson is uncommonly shy. “I would love no images of me at all, but it’s necessary,” she explains, “my body is an encyclopaedia of what I’ve lived and the past.” This is presented as a two-screen projection in which the same material is independently edited by both artists. This creates a visual dissonance in how the same material can be reconstructed, rather than, perhaps, the usual authenticity expected of performance art documentation. Documenting performance art is something Johnson feels strongly about, even to the point she feels it could have hurt her career. “I once had five years’ worth of work in ephemeral art and thought this could be career suicide.” Johnson regards her work as closer to sculpture than theatre. Her body is just one of the materials she uses, found artefacts or considered objects that have had a life before the work take on new identities in the piece. For this installation, she has acquired 1980’s British Army boots and drumsticks addressing her own family’s involvement with the British Army and marching bands that always feels like something that should never be spoken about. The exhibition is unique not just for its subject matter, being given a platform to reflect on Northern Irish identity, particularly from a female with a Protestant background is rare in Dublin – but the investment in the medium. “This exhibition at the Project is so important, because of the scale,” Johnson explains. It’s unusual to see this level of trust in a performance artist in the UK and Ireland. Curator Lívia Páldi explains the commission came out of the 50-year anniversary last year and involves recognising Project Arts Centre as one of Ireland’s oldest public institutions through an ‘active archive’ that learns from the talented artists that have developed their careers there. Project remains a significant space in Dublin for performance artists and can claim credit for launching careers such as that of Nigel Rolfe, Alistair MacLennon and Sandra Johnson. Páldi explains the significance of learning from the past for the institution to grow. “It makes us rethink the changing conditions of artistic labour and production, the new work last year the original concept was to revisit documentary material from her time living in the Liberties during the Celtic Tiger, yet examining the archival material compelled Johnson to confront her own anxieties and feelings of dislocation created by Brexit. The influence of the Celtic Tiger on Dublin arts is significant and something Johnson does explore from her approach. Páldi describes her interest in Johnson as being able to “bring together close observation of social and political situations” but also her “reflection on the practice and operation of performance and the liminality of the body, to show how often overlooked gestures become signifiers of complex realities.” Although her piece has moved away from its initial conception as a reflection on the ‘Celtic Tiger boom’, by virtue of her medium, Johnson is highlighting an absence of mainstream platforms for Irish performance artists in Dublin today. This legacy has, according to Johnson, shaped a commercial art culture that favours art as a product to be exchanged. Often when performance artists are included in an exhibition it will be treated as an event or performance at the opening night, which Johnson regards as “derogatory” to her practice and resists. She exclaims, “It’s like performance artists are treated as entertainment for while people are having a drink.” There will be people in the audience that will be familiar with her work, but also new audiences that will have the opportunity to experience art in a new way. Johnson hopes Dublin audiences connect the archive material with the physical performance. “I hope it prompts people to think of the legacy of violence as unfinished and the legacy of peace as unfinished,” she explains. The increasing commodification of the art world exists not only in the financial exchange but the way audiences consume art through social media. As Johnson outlines, “It doesn’t matter how big a sign you have saying no photography, just by virtue of having a smartphone there are some people that have held a camera in front of me and recorded a live stream.” This approach to using art as a way of presenting themselves as edgy or creative, according to Johnson, violates the contract between the artist and the audience. “The biggest compliment someone has given me is to say thank you for the performance, I really wanted to photograph you but didn’t,” because that shows they respect not only the artist but also understand the complexity of what they are part of and the part they play as witness. Johnson adds, “at its best performance art is a contemplative art work. It’s not experimental theatre or pushing yourself to the edge of life, which is how a lot of people view it, it’s about re-sensitizing human interactions.” 71