A terrible experiment: the artist stood at attention for 6 hours and allowed the audience to do anything with her
The Yugoslav artist, organizer of performances Marina Abramovich is an indisputable authority in the world of contemporary art. Abramovich is called the grandmother of performance art. Her performances and installations continue to be talked about decades later. One of its most famous actions was called "Rhythm 0" and was organized in 1974 in Naples. This performance was fraught with danger even at the stage of the idea, but when it began, events developed too quickly.
The idea of the performance "Rhythm 0" was very simple: Abramovich had to stand still for six hours, while the people who came to see her could do whatever they wanted with her, using any of the 72 objects that she put on the table next to her.
Abramovich was standing in the middle of the room with a sign on her chest that read:
There were "objects for pleasure" and "objects for destruction" on the table. Among the harmless objects were flowers and feathers. Among the dangerous ones are a knife, razor blades and a loaded pistol.
What happened for the next six hours was terrible to say the least.
Art critic Thomas Mcavilly, who watched the performance, recalls:
Then, as Mcavilly said, the following happened: "On the third hour, all her clothes were cut off with blades. On the fourth hour, the same blades began to examine her skin. She was sexually harassed. She was so focused on the work that she wouldn't have resisted either rape or murder." Things have gotten even worse in the last two hours.
Abramovich's own impressions of what people did to her turned out to be even more terrifying. The artist recalls:
When six hours had passed, Abramovich began to walk among the audience. They couldn't look her in the eye.
Abramovich noted after the performance that people did not want any conflict with her. They didn't want to be held responsible or judged for what they were doing. They seemed to want to forget how much they enjoyed hurting her.