Is someone coming to get me? |
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This blog will document an artistic collaboration between Ben Coode-Adams and Kris Cohen. The final work, to be performed from 28th-30th May at the Banff Centre, will stage simultaneous, real-time re-enactments of three related events: the first ascent of Everest in 1953, the coronation of Elizabeth II in 1953, and a commericial climb of Everest in 1996 which ended in disaster.
CONTACT info@bencoodeadams.com Please send us thoughts, photos, questions. Or leave comments using the 'Shout Out' links. We'll post them here or try to use them in the performance.
BIOS Kris Cohen is a research fellow in the INCITE group at the University of Surrey, Dept. of Sociology. Ben Coode-Adams is an artist whose work spans traditional sculpture, video installation, performance and curating. All his work is based on developing innovative means of delivering complex and often esoteric ideas and information, in an engaging and accessible way. Working across disciplines collaboration is a cornerstone of his work. |
Friday, May 30, 2003
Andy Harris and Doug Hansen have just slithered off the ridge into Tibet. It was a most affecting moment as we both watched the wool that links the figure to the bio board plume to the ground. They snaked downwards in a slow tangle. Rob Hall moved down the mountain to the South Summit, where he now sits having disposed his place as best he can. Sandeee has lent us a CD to see us through the night. It is great and perfect for our slightly somber mood, tempered by incapacity. 3:53am. The piece is winding down because we are. I feel really good about it, in the end. I think the piece really engaged people in a variety of ways. And it remained entertaining, so it seems and to my surprise (again). Too tired...i've raced beyond or far behind words. Small dance party here now, for the final hours. Three hours to go, in the strictest sense of loyalty to our own goals. Although loyalty is a serious abstraction on so little sleep. There are climbers stuck high on the mountain, and climbers lost in the whiteout of the storm on the south col. Like the Hastings performance, this stage of the story is particularly non-amenable to our visualisation methods. The storm. The climbers not moving very much. The middle of the night. Our tactics for staying awake. It all lends a sense of calm to a very serious, violent, even dire situation. The situation seems to want theatre techniques for visualisation/dramatisation, but that would attenuate the forensic qualities of the piece. There's a definition of fatigue: indiscriminate use of words like "attenuate". Chris and Ben are real troopers they have now been up for 40 hours and their attention to detail is still pedantic. We are currently watching the procession leaving the abbey and the climbers make it back down to Hillary step to die. The sculpture is magnicent, as is the blokes effort. |
