“Lifting One’s Head Up” : Two Cases of Public Nomadic Interventions

Abstract

The present paper discusses the key findings and implications of the author’s homonymous master’s thesis, a comparative study which aims to develop as a system of overlapping associations between two cases of public nomadic art interventions. Specifically, the study examines the performance of the action Le ballon ροζ or six ways by the author, on the one hand, as well as a sample of five independent works by performance artist Regina José Galindo, on the other. By analysing these interventions, the study aims to enrich the discourse around issues of embodied experience, political claim, and the production of identity and spatiality within a multiple public sphere.
The elaboration of the main performative act, the aforementioned performance piece by the author, occurring following an unprompted urban route in Athens, is utilised as a place of production of this associative system. The distinction of six thematic categories within it are set as an axis of the study’s development, which is achieved through the juxtaposition of corresponding textual units approaching examples from the work of Galindo. This method allows for a deeper understanding of the shared concerns and themes that emerge from the interventions.
The primary texts of the first case, Le ballon ροζ or six ways, acquire characteristics of a performative reading during the original presentation of the research, creating an embodied expression, while the juxtaposed analyses function as interpretations of the primary texts. By utilising this perspective, a degree of distancing from the personal practice is obtained, allowing for a dialectical approach to emerge. At the same time, an associative process is implemented within textual research, in direct correlation to the aforementioned embodied expression, leading to the creation of a multifaceted analysis.
Acknowledging of the ingoing subjective factors or coincidences within the described process is taken as a key assumption in the context of a nomadic view, allowing for transitions and lines of flight between ideas, mental journeys, and the activation of the imaginary.

Overall, a comprehensive and in-depth analysis of the two cases of public nomadic art interventions is accomplished. By utilising a performative reading of the primary texts and a juxtaposition with corresponding textual units, the study provides a unique and innovative approach to examining issues of embodied experience, political claim, gendered identity, and spatiality. Through its intricate analysis of the interventions and their impact on the public sphere, it contributes to the exploration of spatiality through performative practices, highlighting the centrality of political implications.