
BURNOUT
(death of the artist)
painting performance
2023
CAPBARET, Gorvy Theatre
Royal College of Art, London
[dark stage, spotlight]
Enter.
Two assistants roll out a canvas scroll, artist arrives with two oil sticks, music blasts in, [action, 2min50sec], music turns to a gentle lull, artist drops oil sticks mid air, collapses, [death, 10sec], canvas is placed over the body.
End.
Entropy.
The canvas was a mirage, the theatre and people had disappeared. During those three minutes existence whittled down to the ache in my muscles and the blasting sound which led my movements. Do not dare to stop moving. Do not stop. Time was stretching itself to play tricks on me. It suddenly contracted as the sound eased me into the end.
Catharsis.
My inner landscape turned from something resembling the finished canvas to what I could only describe as the Sinemorets sea at sunrise. The place I call my summer home at the end of the world.
All sorts of anxieties that had been plaguing me seemed to have been disintegrated as my mind had rearranged itself into crystal clear structures of idea, thought, recognition and memory.
I sat back in a haze of Sartre’s Existence. Resonating, sheer, and so terribly simple.
BURNOUT (death of the artist) was created and performed at CAPBARET (14 December 2023, Gorvy Theatre, Royal College of Art, London), an evening of performances featuring over 30 live pieces (3 minutes or less each) by MA Contemporary Art Practice students.
Stage assistants: Maria Helena Toscano, Siying Cui
Soundtrack: a combination of 2 minute 50s excerpts of two sound pieces played simultaneously:
HELIOTROPE, SPIME.IM
Melt All the Guns, Devin Gray (feat. Ralph Alessi & Angelica Sanchez)
Performance photographs by Hugo Schaepelynck.

BURNOUT (death of the artist) (2023) at Gorvy Theatre, RCA, London.

BURNOUT (death of the artist) (2023) at Gorvy Theatre, RCA, London.

BURNOUT (death of the artist) (2023) at Gorvy Theatre, RCA, London.

BURNOUT (death of the artist) (2023) at Gorvy Theatre, RCA, London.

BURNOUT (death of the artist) (2023) poster.