The Average Mysterious and the Shirt Off its Back

Pérez Art Museum, Miami
May 7, 2015

Hirshhorn Museum, Washington DC
October 29, 2015

Hauser & Wirth, Los Angeles
December 6, 2016

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The Average Mysterious and the Shirt Off Its Back weaves together a Surrealist play and film with news reports and music of the 1920s. The performance is part of Lutker’s ongoing series investigating the history of the fistfights of the Surrealists.

Originally commissioned by Pérez Art Museum Miami, the play premiered there in 2015 and was also performed at the Hirshhorn Museum. This is the Los Angeles premiere, starring Jenny Greer and Bilal Mir, who originated the roles in Miami and DC, with Nour Mobarak, and Simone Baron on piano.

The performance presents scenes from Louis Aragon’s play, Au Pied du Mur: a dramatic set of exchanges between a man and a woman, and a salesman and an arc-light. The scenes are intercut by news reports and two other works: La Coquille et le Clergyman (The Seashell and the Clergyman), a 1928 film directed by Germaine Dulac written by Antonin Artaud; and 7 Brief Pieces (1920) by Arthur Honegger, a composer closely associated with DADA and Surrealist theater and film.

Total running time, 45 minutes.

Press:
Artforum