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What Do I Do? 1970-2009

Barbara Cleveland
2009

What do I do? (1970-2009) is a two-screen adaptation of two performances by Vito Acconci from the 1970s in which the artist framed simple questions and actions around the basic substance of a performance practice: to utter something; to do something. The artists fragment and repeat Acconci’s speech and actions – saying the words in turn and attempting, blindfolded, to catch a series of tomatoes that are thrown at them from offscreen – while dressed as jesters and fools. Brightly coloured crepe paper, face paint and wizardly black costumes are set against red velvet curtains, like decorations appropriated from a local pantomime.

Sydney
What Do I Do? 1970-2009, 2009 (Excerpt), – via Vimeo 
Brown Council, What Do I Do? 1970-2009, 2009
Brown Council, What Do I Do? 1970-2009, 2009 
What Do I Do? 1970-2009
What Do I Do? 1970-2009