Please Raise Your Hand
Performance
Torpedo Theater, Winter Festival, Amsterdam, January 2019
Video by Jamie Kane
Asking the audience a series of questions. After each question I note a quick percentage of hands up or down on my paper, and read the next one.
This framework lets me look at ideas of public confession, and with it both public shame and public absolution. I've borrowed that last term from religion, there - it doesn't exactly fit, but I'm speaking of that sense of discovering that someone out there has the same problems or hangups as you, that you're not alone. The opposite of that, public shaming, comes into play as well, although in a very voluntary sense.
The questions range from the mundane ("did you eat breakfast") to the philosophical ("do you think truth is attainable"), from awkward questions to serious ones. In them themes of identity, safety, privilege, sex, art, honesty, and other subjects that might be worthy of confession or consideration.