An artist who is famous for her public performances, including one where she let people do whatever they wanted to her for hours, once lived in a gallery for 12 days without food.
Marina Abramovic has put together all sorts of artistic works over the years and very often the artist herself has been at the centre of the piece.
She said she was ‘ready to die’ at the aforementioned exhibit called ‘Rhythm 0’, where people could do what they wanted to her for hours, while during another performance called ‘The Artist is Present’ she sat down and invited people to have a ‘silent conversation’ with her.
There was also the recreation of another artist’s work she did which involved hiding under a ramp in a gallery and masturbating as people walked over her.
Then there was House With Ocean View which she did in 2002 at the Sean Kelly Gallery in New York, where for 12 days she lived in three spaces and ate nothing.
Marina Abramovic in The House With the Ocean View (TIMOTHY A. CLARY/AFP via Getty Images)
Speaking about her decision to go without food for a dozen days, the artist said that she wanted to ‘purify herself’ and just live in the three spaces that represented her house, with the ladders leading up to them having steps made out of knives with the blades pointing up.
She said: “House With Ocean View was for me an experiment.
“When I came to New York, it was just after September 11, and I found New York so much changed. I found New York and people living here different, more emotional, more vulnerable, more spiritual.”
She explained that she wanted to ‘purify myself without eating for 12 days’, hoping that it would ‘change the attitude of people coming to see me’.
Abramovic slept on a bed with no mattress and the design of House With Ocean View meant everyone could see what she was doing at all times.
For 12 days she lived in these three spaces and ate nothing (TIMOTHY A. CLARY/AFP via Getty Images)
There was no privacy when she showered, used the toilet or slept, and anyone coming into the exhibit had to accept that there would be no talking.
Abramovic also made the gallery staff agree that they would not interfere with the performance no matter what happened.
She said that the point of the exhibition was not about starving herself for a dozen days, explaining that it was for people to change how they felt.
“If they will just come and stay and forget about the time,” the artist explained.
“I have in this period people who came first just for a few minutes and then stay for three hours, four hours, and come next day to stay even longer, without really understanding what’s happening.”