Kira O’Reilly’s performance Inthewrongplaceness (2006), involved her dancing naked and caressing the carcass of a dead pig. Her performance appeared to broach the subject of our continued reliance upon pigs and other animals for our well being. Pig products are currently used to produce insulin for diabetics and experimental pigs have been genetically modified to carry a human gene, so that their organs, once transplanted into a human recipient would cause no rejection.
O’Reilly’s performance allowed viewers to touch her flesh as well as the animal whilst she was wearing latex gloves, highlighting perhaps that although close alliances have been established in contemporary biomedicine between humans and animals, protective measures should be deployed so that contagion of dangerous cross-species viruses will not occur.
At several points in the performance when O’Reilly’s body was intertwined with that of the pig there was no way of distinguishing human from animal limbs ( this was also a distinguishing feature of Patricia Piccinini’s piece The Young Family, 2002). O’Reilly’s lively body provided a strong contrast with that of the limp animal, which she animated by pulling it around and propping it up against her body. This emphasized the direct relationship between the death of the animal and the obvious life and energy that she possessed, but also the responsibility that we have towards animals that are killed for our benefit.
When we view Piccinini’s The Young Family and O’Reilly’s Inthewrongplaceness we understand the affinity’s between the human and the animal through bodiment and touch. I use the term bodiment here, rather than embodiment, because as Ralph R. Acampora points out bodiment is ‘…a term that deliberately resists the inner/outer distinction that abides in the more familiar term of ‘embodiment’. Bodiment is relevant to this discussion of the artworks, since it is through the materiality of the creatures (human/animal) that evokes the tactile and direct relationship between each entity.
Julie Clarke© 2008
O'Reilly's performance was executed at Penzance Town Centre, U.K. on 19 August, 2006.
Please see the following link for information about Kira O'Reilly's new performance.
http://www.artscatalyst.org/projects/global/interspecies.html
O’Reilly’s performance allowed viewers to touch her flesh as well as the animal whilst she was wearing latex gloves, highlighting perhaps that although close alliances have been established in contemporary biomedicine between humans and animals, protective measures should be deployed so that contagion of dangerous cross-species viruses will not occur.
At several points in the performance when O’Reilly’s body was intertwined with that of the pig there was no way of distinguishing human from animal limbs ( this was also a distinguishing feature of Patricia Piccinini’s piece The Young Family, 2002). O’Reilly’s lively body provided a strong contrast with that of the limp animal, which she animated by pulling it around and propping it up against her body. This emphasized the direct relationship between the death of the animal and the obvious life and energy that she possessed, but also the responsibility that we have towards animals that are killed for our benefit.
When we view Piccinini’s The Young Family and O’Reilly’s Inthewrongplaceness we understand the affinity’s between the human and the animal through bodiment and touch. I use the term bodiment here, rather than embodiment, because as Ralph R. Acampora points out bodiment is ‘…a term that deliberately resists the inner/outer distinction that abides in the more familiar term of ‘embodiment’. Bodiment is relevant to this discussion of the artworks, since it is through the materiality of the creatures (human/animal) that evokes the tactile and direct relationship between each entity.
Julie Clarke© 2008
O'Reilly's performance was executed at Penzance Town Centre, U.K. on 19 August, 2006.
Please see the following link for information about Kira O'Reilly's new performance.
http://www.artscatalyst.org/projects/global/interspecies.html
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