Anna Fafaliou Sleep
‘I’m a London based conceptual artist, although lately I consider myself to be a nomad. My interests are around the notion of “self” and what it is and how it feels to be a human. I get inspired by observing human behavior. My work focuses on the fluidity and instability of our visual perception and memory in relation to the physical presence. Inspired by the notion of memory, identity & visual perception I create installations & performances exploring the relationship between object, memory and space. The play between reality & abstraction stands at the forefront of my projects. What interests me the most is to create engaging projects that intrigue the audience to participate.’ – Anna Fafaliou
Her project Sleep is an unrehearsed performance with audience participation where Fafaliou creates dialogue between physical presence and architecture through the sleeping bodies. She offers the audience pillows to join her in sleeping in the space giving them freedom in where they would like to lie.
One of the things she is interested in is the sociopsychology of the participants and how they place themselves within the space.
This is what Anna said about the results in different venues:
‘In a gallery space in London for example, people would try to create an intimate space for themselves, it was very rare to see people laying down together or in close proximity to the performers, unless they were coming as a group. On the contrary when the performance travelled to the Bangkok Art & Culture Centre, the participants would literally place their pillows on me. They were all laying down next to each other to create every time a circle around me.’
@anna_fafaliou on Instagram
The Maybe Tilda Swinton
Originally performed in 1995 in Serpentine Gallery in London The Maybe was a collaboration with Cornelia Parker. In 2013 Swinton took up the role of the woman sleeping in the glass box once again this time as a solo performance. In 1995 she slept in the gallery of eight hours a day for seven days of the exhibition however, for her comeback in MoMA there was no schedule/ plan for the performances- a true ‘maybe’.
“The Maybe 1995/2013. Living artist, glass, steel, mattress, pillow, linen, water and spectacles.”
Project
Okay this will be interesting…
For my project I will be recording myself falling asleep.
During the Monday tutorial Miranda told me that one of the equipment available for us to book out is a CCTV set which would be great for the project!
Wish me luck!