MASCARADE MARATHON Galerie de l’erg Erg Esa Brussels 6th November 2019
Nina André & Margareta Klose & participants of the audience
How to participate in an image? We take part, the mask is the message, we are the image. Mascarade Marathon
is a procession for our most revolutionary image: the mask. It shows what it hides, it’s presence shows an
absence: It is a paradox. The mask is hiding the face, we speak and sing through it, „per-sonare“ the Romans
called it. But the mask shows as well as it hides, it replaces and transforms the face: The ancient Greek word
„prosopon“ means both face & mask. WHAT IS LOVE? BABY DON’T HURT ME!Body and medium coincide in the dialectical image: we take part, the mask is the message, we are the image.
To participate in an image, rather than identify with it, would mean participating in the material of the image
as well as in the desires and forces it accumulates. I CAN’T BE YOUR HERO, BABY! Famous pop songs such
as IN HEAVEN EVERYTHING IS FINE will guide us through l’erg, école de recherche graphique Bruxelles,
this beautiful late 70s/80s garage, as well as our masks and costumes, dance moves, gestures, Pathos Poses and
Performances in different scenes, stations, in different locations: on the stairs, tables, chairs, on the rooftop.
The audience will be present and absent: LIVE via Instagram we will chat with artists in non-European
countries playing with our body brain extension, the smartphone, and messenger’s face masks. The present
audience will have to KEEP IT UP, running, filming, dancing, eating and drinking with us. MASCARADE
MARATHON MOVIE SCREENING erg / école de recherche graphique The participation of the cameras
and Smartphones that will be filming the Mascarade Marathon will create hybrids between live situation and
documentation. So it will also undermine the boundaries between production, reception and perception. With
the Screening in erg’s auditorium/cinema on 13th November (while performing the Grand Massage after the
Mascarade Marathon) and its documentation and then digitalisation on our websites and blogs, our movie will
be finally a presentation of a presentation circulating in the world wide web after the act.
The medium is the image. The medium is the trace of itself.