Surrogate Performing

Surrogate performing first requires that a performance artist performs as another. This does not mean they merely act, but that they are as the other, becoming them. The purpose of this is to allow for remote performing when physically unavailable, to expand the meaning of the art collective, and to facilitate the formation of new work relationships between individuals and within the performance network.

The significance becomes clear when we consider the disparate locations of artists in any international festival- at least the invitation lists. Ability to travel, physically and financially determine attendance to events. Geographical and cultural distinctions then become important considerations addressed by surrogate performing- the surrogate performance as an alternative means of travel and replacement for resource.

In surrogate performing, an artist will compose or determine a performance for the surrogate. Its nature will be as a performance one writes for oneself, not another. The act of becoming may require familiarization with the artist as an individual, and this may be necessary to varying degrees of spontaneous decision, or improvisation- requiring the surrogate know thought process and inner working of the source artist. Of course, the relationship may become reciprocal, as might be expected as a parallel to the model of the international festival network. The extent to which this may forge unique work, working methods, and tangential forms will only be known through the experimental following through of this and other surrogate projects.

Lewis Gesner