Report of ACT2 on Friday 25 April 2003
Place: Between Donner and H&M

The reason why I wanted to cooperate with Carla was in a way very selfish. I was interested in how I would find it to go out with somebody else’s work. Because I don’t have any goals I want to get out or something, I can just do it and see what happens. If I do something with my own work I always have a goal and sometimes I curious how I would analyse if it wasn’t my own work. The place I choose has much to do with the day and the weather. Because it is warm but not sunny it is not really a typical swimming day. Because it is Friday many teenagers are early of and go the shopping center, I thought. And I was curious how they would react. That’s why I choose this spot. First thing was, ok, how must put this thing up? I did it with Carla a long time a go and it took me now quit a while to have straight. Then I sat down and watched, in the first few minutes people where looking at me and then to the puppet theater, but then people didn’t make a connection between the theater and me. I found that comfortable. It was fun to see people stopping and watching. Going on and talking to each other with their hands like in a puppet. People were laughing and watching at the puppet theater. What would they have in their heads? Is that important to me? Isn’t it enough that they see it and make an image in their heads how it would work? Then I couldn’t help thinking about Carla and I decided to stand up and start people asking if they would like to play. One child was interested, but wanted first an Ice cream. The other people I asked all said no, and during this part I found harder and harder to ask people. In a way I asked myself: what will they remember; me or the puppet theater? After a while I got to tired of breaking in peoples private space that I got back to my first spot and went on with just looking and waiting. Again people looked, watched, stopped, laughed, walked away, looked, watched, stopped, laughed, walked away, and so on. But one thing was what stroked me the most, the half of the people who walked away where playing with their hands and talked to their friends in this puppet way. After I while I was beginning to ask myself; isn’t that the same as playing in the theater itself? They use the body language, the voices, and the characters given. This is a strange result, but no, it is not the same, because it is not public, it is in the private surrounding of friends; in a way it was not open for others. Then all of the sudden a group the teenagers came in, exactly the kind I was hoping for (15/16 years old). They began playing for each other for quit a while. The boys for the girls and the girls where giggling like hell. Another thing that was fun to see was the boys where telling each other who was what kind of person, so it worked like a lesson in society. Other people where also looking to the play of the boys and a small audience was then created. When the boys stopped the audience fell apart in people who where going on and people who wanted to see the puppets more closely. After this it was again just looking, watching, stopping and laughing. A little girl and her brother played with saddam and bush, but not for long. The fun thing was that after this the sat next to me. In a way it was great to so how they not made the connection between the puppet theater and me. Again looking, watching, stopping and laughing. And again the wonderful playing with the hands of people, I like that so much. Then suddenly something strange happened. The punkers were running to the theater and played for only half a minute and then went on running. In the first moment I thought that they took the puppets, but that was not what happened. A few seconds later a woman ran next to me screaming: ‘Houd de dief!’ Something like: Stop the thief! The two punk boys stole her purse and where running and laughing. This stroked me very much, not because of the purse, but because an object like this puppet theater easily stopped them but nobody, nobody human stopped the two punk boys. So a puppet theater can, and a person not? I sat there for a while and enjoyed the playing with the hands of people when it again was all relaxing. But, yeah, I just felt that I had to go now. My conclusion of this afternoon is that I didn’t like that I would be in the memory of people when they thought of this little event. I felt it was more sincere to let the puppet theater alone, even if this means that not many people are playing with it. But, by the way, people where playing with it in their own private surrounding of friends. And for me it wasn’t important that that playing was public, their laughs, their thoughts maybe, their hands said enough.

Mirijam


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http://www.anti-anti.net/act2/

Carla.
posted by carla at 2:41 PM

No team 14.40 - 15.50
Characters, Rumsfeld, Bush, Saddam, Balkende and for the first time Gerrit Zalm - head of the VVD, the party that will form the coalition with the CDA for the new government.

Has usual I left from Piet Zwart, today with the idea of staging the structure, alone, for the last time. I head to Binnenwegplein, the selected spot where I go over and over. But when I arrived, a couple, dressed in last century copper coloured outfits were playing "statue" for the by-standers, the patat eaters, sitting on the wooden benches on another shinny "holy" day.
Since I didn't plan to "compete with them, I decided to move to a similar spot, the beginning of the Hoogstraat, another commercial and "promenade" area. Even though, today, monday after Easter, the shops are not open, but the coffee and thee houses, ice-cream shops, and all sort of snack bars are. I placed my interactive puppet theatre in a quiet place, where people pass calmly, and stood there watching. Thinking on the development of the world events. Just a week ago there was still a sort of emergency on going out with the platform to keep the discussion about the war alive, and today it was completely clear the war is over, and somehow people , relieved, don't find anything that bad anymore about the whole issue anymore.

It didn't raise so many reactions today, or as lively, as before, except for a couple of people, and a men that with is car keys crossed over Saddam Hussein image pasted on the box. I stood there, inconspicuous, or trying to, still I was spotted and talked with a homeless men, some others winked an eye at me as to say - "Goed man!" ,saw for the first time the entire structure collapsed on the floor due to the wind, thinking O.K. it's the end of it, but it wasn't the case, it had just a few scratches, which really surprised me, so the show went on.

There's a lot of things that came to my mind during this hour. Why I started this action, for example, the wish to engage people, by actual interaction and manipulation of hand puppets, to raise higher questions about their position in the world: manipulated beings or controllers of their own opinions, desires and destinies. To the development of the war issue and the emergency of giving the platform to raise awareness around how mass media manipulate our opinions, to let it be used and interpreted freely by the participants and passers-by. Or how to continue now, that the feeling of urgency is there again for different reasons, because the war issue seems being putted on our backs as something that had to happen, that had it bad consequences but we should think about the future. And what about the time that millions of people were demonstrating to say that this was not their choice? Can this go on as nothing had happened? I have to redefine the role for this structure for now on, and consider its life time. Something that I always though, it will stop at one point, I though maybe when it became so much part of the city life that it is not a surprise anymore, it does not astonish or alienates anyone. Today I had hint of that possibility when at one point a couple walking around, asked me to take a picture of them next to the structure. I don't know if they were aware of me as the responsible, or if they just though of that spot as the one with the best light, but anyway, this enamoured pair will take home 2 pictures of them standing next to a green wooden box, picturing the political key figures of the moment, both in the world as in the Nederland’s, that until now still function as a open stage.


posted by carla at 3:08 PM