Queer artist and zombie, Martin O’Brien, currently the artist-in-residence at London’s renowned Whitechapel Gallery, has a fabulous new performance there on 22nd July from 6-11pm.
A spectacular exploration of death and immortality, for Overture For The End (As Ashen Place) O’Brien is joined by an auspicious cast of young queers and old queens including celebrated LA performance artist Sheree Rose.
Featuring O’Brien’s signature blend of humour and action, the work calls in the undead to playfully imagine the potential for immortality and a future without an eternity of nothingness. This work will be presented within the frame of the Life Is More Important Than Art programme this summer at Whitechapel Gallery www.whitechapelgallery.org/life-is-more-important-than-art/
In Overture For The End (As Ashen Place), bodies crawl through soot-covered landscapes. A ghastly figure stands with a whip in hand, unearthly sounds emanating from her mouth. A funeral procession for the living marches by, trumpets sounding, and the mourners weep but they don’t know why. A group of skeletal forms sit at a dining table as if awaiting a feast.
O’Brien turns the gallery into a place of decay, part hellscape, part apocalyptic landscape, filled with strange bodies performing deathly actions. The performance imagines repetitive cycles of life and death. It imagines an eternity of continuation with a promise of death that never arrives. It explores the sounds of life and death: breath, song, shrieks, calls, wailing, screaming, gasping. Sheree Rose takes on the figure of an old crone, a banshee, watching over the cycles and actions of O’Brien, intervening in different moments.
The cry of the banshee signals someone is about to die….
Says O’Brien: “I’m so excited to be working at Whitechapel on this series. This piece is the biggest yet and will allow me to create something on a large scale. Art is a survival strategy for me and many others that live with life shortening illness. I’m particularly excited to have my long-term collaborator, Sheree Rose, coming from LA to work with me on this. It develops our ongoing collaborations exploring ageing, friendship, kink, and intergenerational family.”
Martin lives with cystic fibrosis, and continues to outlive his life expectancy whilst remaining active and prolific, hence earning his coveted ‘zombie’ status.
His last performance sold out so book tickets while you can.
Booking link: www.whitechapelgallery.org/events/overture-for-the-end-an-ashen-place/
Queerguru’s Contributing Editor Ris Fatah is a successful fashion/luxury business consultant (when he can be bothered) who divides and wastes his time between London and Ibiza. He is a lover of all things queer, feminist, and human rights in general. @ris.fatah
