IT TAKES ONE TO KNOW ONE
at ONE AND OTHER, TRAFALGAR SQUARE, LONDON 24 July, 2009
I was chosen by algorithm out of over 35,000 applicants to be part of One and Other, an event curated by noted British contemporary artist Antony Gormley. He asked participants to occupy the empty Fourth Plinth in Trafalgar Square, London every hour, 24 hours a day, for 100 days between July and October, creating a portrait of the UK. A different person occupied the plinth each hour. The other three sculpture plinths in the Square are occupied by statues of kings and generals, representing the status quo of power for hundreds of years.
I expanded my work with mirrors into an interactive performance on the Fourth Plinth at 9:00 am UK time, July 24, 2009 using a video-activated mirror built by Don Aupperle. Live webcams broadcast the event in real time.
"So 100 days of continuous occupation of a statue's plinth by 2,400 real people have ended. It has changed my life and that of many others. No fewer than 2,400 people from as far afield as the Shetland Islands and Penzance have occupied the plinth for sixty minutes each, picked at random from nearly 35,000 who applied.
"Who can be represented in art? How can we make it? How can we experience it? These are questions that have exercised me for years. Whether you see the plinth as a protest or pole-dance platform; studio or stocks; playpen or pulpit; as a frame for interrogation or for meditation, it has provided an open space of possibility for many to test their sense of self and how they might communicate this to a wider world."
Antony Gormley, October 2009
