update from sonv

rehearsed in the space yesterday... we'll be in the round, in a gallery-type space. exactly what we were hoping for! kimi's sound cues sound great (including the singing!), the paper and plastic plates are nice and awkward, and i'm trying to chill out about struggling to remember philosophical statements that were originally written to be read, not to perform. we perform at 7 and 9pm tonight; 8pm tomorrow... kimi - wish you were here!

our super sweet voice distortion toy

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/images/B000XUG2WW/ref=dp_image_0?ie=UTF8&n=165793011&s=toys-and-games

script, third revision

As audience gets into place: two timers are set. Customer sits and reads menu. Waitress US of table. Movement sequence...

C: read menu
W: wipe spot on table
C: coffee/plate rim AND W: fill water, fill coffee
C: no coffee
C: read menu
W: take order (write) (drop pencil)
C: fill condiments
W: turn in order
W: fill condiments (drop condiment)
C: reach, write
C: drop pencil, write
W: carry heavy dishes
W: reach over to deliver food
C: coffee/plate rim AND W: fill condiments
W: wipe table
W: pour water SR
C: signal for check
W: pour water at table
C: no water
W: reach across to give check
W: leave, carry heavy dishes
C: remember tip
C: (drop change) AND W: (drop pencil)
C: signal waitress
W: signal customer

Customer sits in a chair US. Waitress goes to mic in audience.

Voice: Please be aware that someone might be watching you from a hidden camera, so you must be on your best behavior at all times. (Customer nods.)

Voice: Please turn on the television. (Customer nods again, goes to the timer sitting on a table SR, and turns it on.)

Voice: Please call the Learner in and flip the switch. If she does not comply with the rules, please switch the first button in front of you.

Customer nods, calls out: Go! (Waitress enters near chair with ticking timer.)

Customer flips a switch on the table. Waitress crosses to table, resetting timer. Customer crosses back to chair.

Customer slowly scans menu. Simultaneously, Waitress pours water in four directions.

Waitress turns timer to buzz.

Customer sings a list of objects. Waitress resets her timer, then balances two ticking timers – one in each hand. She tries to repeat words the Customer is singing, but gets them wrong. Each time, the Customer glares at her and Waitress freezes before they continue.

Customer:

The list...
Chair
Table
Desk lamp
Clipboard
Egg timer
Light switches
Memory cards
Buzzer
Rhinoceros mask
Cups of coffee
Shoe
Horn
Steam
Race
Helmet
Captain
Forest
Staple
Balcony

Waitress buzzes timer.

Recorded Voice: Each morning, they would put on the masks and perform their roles for the neighborhood; a signpost to the world that everything was as it should be.

Waitress delivers mask to Customer and says: Eggs?

Waitress goes back to table and takes mask for herself. Both put on masks. Customer faces US, Waitress faces DS.

Waitress (whispering): I once had a healer tell me that guilt is a useless emotion. I believe her. But then I begin to feel guilty about not feeling guilty. What is this? Meta-guilt?

Both: pick up change gesture; pick up pencil gesture; juggle mask away from face to right; mask back to face.

Customer: Is the guilt greater or lesser because of distance?

Both make half turn and one step closer; Waitress faces US, Customer faces DS.

Waitress: I once had a healer tell me that guilt is a useless emotion. I believe her. But then I begin to feel guilty about not feeling guilty. What is this? Meta-guilt?

Masks become trays; pouring water gesture 4 times, gradually getting closer to each other.

Customer: Is the guilt greater or lesser because of distance?

Waitress and Customer are extremely close; circle as they repeat (yell) their lines to each other. End Waitress facing US, Customer facing DS.

Customer begins polishing coffee cup gesture with plate.

Waitress: I can no longer live without you. (Goes to table and stacks plates on arm... plates get heavier and heavier as she sinks to the ground.)

Customer: There is no greater love than the love the wolf feels for the lamb it doesn’t eat. The other side of the scene is the paradoxical refined magnificent love of the wolf. It’s not difficult for the ewe to love the lamb. But for the wolf?

Waitress: That need overwhelms us.

Customer: The wolf’s love for the lamb is such a renunciation, it’s a Christ-like move, it’s the wolf’s sacrifice – it’s a love that could never be requited. This wolf that sacrifices its very definition for the lamb, this wolf that doesn’t eat the lamb, is it a wolf? Is it still a wolf?

Waitress: Why does the idea that you are going to eat me up fill me with such pleasure and such terror? It’s to get this pleasure that you need the wolf. The wolf is the truth of love, its cruelty, its fangs, its claws, our aptitude for ferocity.

Customer lays her plate on top of the stack and Waitress falls to ground, spilling plates everywhere.

Recorded Voice sings the following several times:

Forward, the Light Brigade!
Was there a man dismay'd?
Not tho' the soldier knew
Someone had blunder'd:
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

During the singing, Waitress picks up the plates. Customer hands out light switches to audience members and instructs them to turn them on and off at will. When they do this, a buzzer will sound. Customer operates this buzzer. Each time buzzer goes, Waitress goes into shock, then continues her task. When song finishes...

Waitress (kneeling behind table): Mother, may I fill the glasses with water?

Waitress moves (gesture dance) by end of Customer’s monologue, ends near chair with plates held above head.

Customer (to audience): I’m really sorry. The researcher told me I had to do it. If she were here I could argue with her, but I don’t think she can even hear me. I feel really guilty, I mean, I could have been you in this experiment. If you want to switch places … but I think we have to stay in theses roles. You know the moves. Enter the room, stop, say Mother may I fill the glasses with water, proceed after confirmation, and fill glasses C, M, O, T, H, D, R, K, W, V, Q, A, L, E, and P, in that order. You know the moves. I don't think we really should be talking. Not that I don't want to talk to you. But I think in the rules it states that there should be no contact between us. I'm sorry.

Waitress spills all the plates again and freezes.

Customer: You didn’t say “Mother, may I fill the glasses with water?”

Waitress: The danger is when you create a world, designed as a whole and for a whole people, made up of two individuals. This world-of-two depends for its survival on a single other person.

Both begin to repeat gesture sequence from top of show.

Waitress: The world-of-two is immediately surrounded and threatened by death. Death closes in around it tightly. Love immortalizes me. Only that which gives me life can take it away from me. That which gives, gives to enjoy, that which gives to enjoy, gives to fear its loss. Give to lose. The gift and its opposite.

Customer: That is incorrect.

Customer lays down tip on table and repeats: That is incorrect.

Customer and Waitress continue gesture sequence, becoming more clumsy and extreme until Customer turns off both timers.

Customer and Waitress look at each other, flip off switches around their necks, and we hear recorded scream.

Waitress and Customer look at audience.

Recorded Voice: You have just taken part in an experiment. You voluntarily participated. You were the subject of our experiment. Thank you for your participation.

Waitress and Customer walk out.

officially listed

performance descriptions:

http://www.sonfestival.org/performances.php

festival overview:

http://www.sonfestival.org/index.php

Okay, I found a canticle of The Charge of the Light Brigade
http://www.mochinet.com/recitals/COTLB-C.mp3

Kimi's reponse to initial script

Thanks for the script! It’s a bit difficult for me to comment without actually seeing what’s going on, but I’ll try. I like inter-cutting with the Cixous … it brings a depth to the relationship between the waitress and customer. But in that vein, I kind of want to see that relationship evolve more ... to keep it from feeling too sado-masochistic. They do feel very distant from one another throughout (or is the dance when they become physically closer to one another and therefore psychologically closer? Is it the two of them against the researcher? What sparks this dance?) I think we need to consider carefully how the audience is invited to participate. In a sense, the Customer has become the Researcher. I almost feel like the audience ought to see the Customer shocking the Learner first. She apologizes to the Learner, and then surreptitiously invites the audience to do the same exact thing, thereby trying to relieve her guilt. The fear brings them together. One comment about objects … I think it might be more dramatic if you got plastic plates from Walmart (the kind for outdoors that look like they’re porcelein). When they fall they will clatter and make more of an impact. I’ll look into borrowing the portable audio recorder. What sort of tune should I use for the song? I’ll also look into that ibackup site. I think I need something like it for my Crane Wife project.

process

today we bought objects, including light-switches, red dog collars, red bungee cord, red rope, red paper plates, a cheap distortion mic, and 3 kitchen timers (we may only use 2). we do also have learning cards and gold stars, but i'm guessing we won't use those at that point.

we also developed the 15 gestures from our earlier lists.

rough script we developed from our three sets of 5 minutes is in the previous post.

tomorrow's schedule: in the late morning/early afternoon i'll be working on the gesture dances , and then brianne and i will rehearse together again from 4-6, putting the pieces together. kimi will be giving feedback and recording her sections.

other things to do:

- record "recorded voice" sections
- buy apron(s)
- find a table
- figure out beginning and end, particularly as it may involve the audience
- make masks
- buy more red plates?
- find and work with light
- make labels

what we worked on today

Customer (Brianne) enters space. [She wears a nametag labeling her as the “Teacher.”??] She sits in a chair facing away from the audience at the upstage end of the space. She listens.

Voice (Michelle, in audience, through distortion mic): “Please be aware that someone might be watching you from a hidden camera, so you must be on your best behavior at all times.” The Teacher nods.

Voice: “Please turn on the television.” The Teacher nods again, goes to the timer sitting on a table SR, and turns it on quickly and precisely (to 15 minutes).

Voice: “Please call the Learner in and flip the switch. If she does not comply with the rules stated beforehand, please press the first button in front of you.

The Teacher nods again, calls out, “Go!” and flips a switch on the table.

The Waitress (Michelle) hurriedly enters from audience to DSL with a tray holding a ticking timer in her left hand (or she sets the timer for one minute?). [She is also wearing a nametag, but it says, “Learner.”??]

Customer crosses back to chair (SL) and sits. Waitress crosses to SR of table. Timers tick.

• Customer holds up a menu and slowly scans it, eyes intensely focused, moving her head slowly from the left side of the menu to the right side of the menu in fifteen seconds. Then moving in the same way right to left in fifteen seconds. Repeat both directions once more.

• Simultaneously, Waitress pours water in four directions.

(Timer buzzes?)

Customer sings a list of objects [while eating soup??]. Waitress intermittently turns on and off a fluorescent lamp. Each time the light goes on, Customer flinches, but keeps singing. The list:

Chair
Table
Desk lamp
Clipboard
Egg timer
Light switches
Memory cards
Buzzer
Rhinoceros mask
Cups of coffee
Shoe
Horn
Steam
Race
Helmet
Captain
Forest
Staple
Balcony

Recorded voice (Kimi): “Each morning, they would put on the masks and perform their roles for the neighborhood; a signpost to the world that everything was as it should be.”

Waitress delivers mask to Customer, goes back to table and takes mask for herself. Both the waitress and the customer put on masks. Customer faces US, Waitress faces DS.

From opposite ends of the stage, on a diagonal, the waitress and the customer alternately yell the following at one another.

Waitress: “I once had a healer tell me that guilt is a useless emotion. I believe her. But then I begin to feel guilty about not feeling guilty. What is this? Meta-guilt?”

(pick up change gesture; pick up pencil gesture; juggle mask away from face to right; mask back to face)

Customer: “Is the guilt greater or lesser because of distance?”

Both make half turn and one step closer; Waitress faces US, Customer faces DS.

Waitress: “I once had a healer tell me that guilt is a useless emotion. I believe her. But then I begin to feel guilty about not feeling guilty. What is this? Meta-guilt?”

(masks become trays; pouring water gesture 4 times, each time getting closer to each other)

Customer: “Is the guilt greater or lesser because of distance?”

Waitress and Customer circle as they repeat their lines to each other.

Then, over the dialogue below...
• Customer: polishing coffee cup gesture with plate.
• Waitress: heavy trays gesture into stacking plates on arm... plates get heavier and heavier as she sinks to the ground.

Waitress: I do not order your immortality. I can no longer live without you. That need overwhelms us. That’s why anguish bursts forth: because the need pushes us toward the realization – no matter what, yes, I must die.

Customer: There is no greater love than the love the wolf feels for the lamb it doesn’t eat. The other side of the scene is the paradoxical refined magnificent love of the wolf. It’s not difficult for the ewe to love the lamb. But for the wolf? The wolf’s love for the lamb is such a renunciation, it’s a Christ-like move, it’s the wolf’s sacrifice – it’s a love that could never be requited. This wolf that sacrifices its very definition for the lamb, this wolf that doesn’t eat the lamb, is it a wolf? Is it still a wolf?

Waitress: Why does the idea that you are going to eat me up fill me with such pleasure and such terror? It’s to get this pleasure that you need the wolf. The wolf is the truth of love, its cruelty, its fangs, its claws, our aptitude for ferocity.

Customer lays her plate on top of the stack and Waitress falls to ground, spilling plates everywhere.

Kimi (recorded) sings the following several times:

Forward, the Light Brigade!
Was there a man dismay'd?
Not tho' the soldier knew
Someone had blunder'd:
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

At the same time Kimi is singing:
• Waitress tries to sing with her while picking up the plates.
• Customer hands out light switches to audience members and instructs them to turn them on and off at will. When they do this, a buzzer will sound
• Customer operates this buzzer. Each time buzzer goes, Waitress goes into shock, then continues her task and singing as she is able.

At the end of the song, Waitress (kneeling behind table): “Mother, may I fill the glasses with water?”

Customer speaks to audience: “I’m really sorry. The researcher told me I had to do it. If she were here I could argue with her, but I don’t think she can even hear me. I feel really guilty, I mean, I could have been you in this experiment. If you want to switch places … but I think we have to stay in theses roles. You know the moves. Enter the room, stop, say Mother may I fill the glasses with water, proceed after confirmation, and fill glasses C, M, O, T, H, D, R, K, W, V, Q, A, L, E, and P, in that order. You know the moves.” The Teacher looks around nervously. "I don't think we really should be talking. Not that I don't want to talk to you. But I think in the rules it states that there should be no contact between us. I'm sorry."

• While Customer is speaking, Waitress moves (gesture dance) to SL, ends with plates held above head.

Without turning, the Teacher says, “You didn’t say ‘Mother, may I fill the glasses with water?’”

Waitress spills all the plates again.

Waitress: "The danger is when you create a world, designed as a whole and for a whole people, made up of two individuals. This world-of-two depends for its survival on a single other person. The world-of-two is immediately surrounded and threatened by death. Death closes in around it tightly. Love immortalizes me. Only that which gives me life can take it away from me. That which gives, gives to enjoy, that which gives to enjoy, gives to fear its loss. Give to lose. The gift and its opposite."

[?? - Waitress looks at audience member and says, "Zoom. Fourteen minutes. Zoom. Another fourteen minutes. Zoom."]

Customer: "That is incorrect." She lays down tip on table and repeats, "That is incorrect"

Customer and Waitress dance. [?? - Audience member (instructed earlier? or sparked by an action?) sounds buzzer intermittently. Each time buzzer sounds, there is a misstep.]

Dance becomes more and more chaotic and clumsy. Customer and Waitress are driven further and further apart.

At end of dance, both Customer and Waitress flip off switches around their necks, and we hear recorded scream.

Waitress and Customer look at audience.

Recorded Voice: [Something along the lines of...] “You have just taken part in an experiment. You voluntarily participated. You were the subject of our experiment. Thank you for your participation.”

potential overall structure for 150v

First three minutes: Kimi gives audience instructions on how this is going to work (via phone... talking to one audience member who repeats the instructions for all to hear? or is Kimi mic'ed?). At the same time, Brianne and Michelle set up the movement vocabulary (establish repeatable sequence).

Minutes 4-14: Some arrangement of our 3 sets of 5 minutes (obviously edited and/or overlapping to now fit into eleven minutes). Perhaps there is a recorded distant scream that goes every minute so we can track the time. During these minutes, the following progressions take place:

- pain of learner morphs into pain of teacher
- lists of words turn into more silence, along with buzzer sounds (and ticking of egg timers?)
- "normal" interaction becomes more and more distant, disconnected, questioning, stylized
- audience members seemingly have less and less choice over their own actions over the 11 minutes (have to follow Kimi's directions)

Minute 15: a debrief. This might be a short paragraph (or a couple sentences) that all three of us read (ie, "You have been participating in an experiment...")

our performance venue...

is the Side Arm Gallery

(click to see the space, directions, etc)

sent for program

Our bio:

Bird on a Wire is an ever-transforming ensemble of artists who work across geographical distance to create original, physically and visually dynamic performances that activate dialogue within communities. The current incarnation of the ensemble includes Kimi Maeda (Columbia, SC), Michelle Milne (Goshen, IN), and Brianne Waychoff (Baton Rouge, LA). They have worked individually and together performing, writing, designing, directing and teaching theatre and performance on both coasts, in the Midwest and in Southeast U.S.

Updated short description:

Based on Stanley Milgram’s experiments in the 1960s, 150v: Milgram’s Tip explores the outer limits of obedience to authority through the lens of a Waitress and a Customer.

Structured as an experiment, the performance asks questions: To what extent are we willing to obey an authority figure, no matter what the cost? And what role does the physical distance between two people play in one’s willingness to inflict pain on the other?

In Bird on a Wire's performative experiment, movement and language of a “normal” social situation repeat and build to the point of absurdity as the stakes get raised higher and higher, approaching the point of no return.

5 Minutes ABCDE

A. 1 Minute: The waitress stands in the far upstage left corner holding a clipboard. On the clipboard sits and egg timer. The customer sits downstage center in a chair at the table. The waitress sets the timer for one minute. As the minute goes, the customer holds up a menu and slowly scans it, eyes intensely focused, moving their head slowly from the left side of the menu to the right side of the menu in fifteen seconds. Then moving in the same way right to left in fifteen seconds. Repeat both directions once more.

B. 1 Minute: The waitress hovers over the customer who is running their finger around the rim of their coffee cup. The following is exchanged:

Waitress: I do not order your immortality. I can no longer live without you. That need overwhelms us. That’s why anguish bursts forth: because the need pushes us toward the realization – no matter what, yes, I must die.

Customer: There is no greater love than the love the wolf feels for the lamb it doesn’t eat. The other side of the scene is the paradoxical refined magnificent love of the wolf. It’s not difficult for the ewe to love the lamb. But for the wolf? The wolf’s love for the lamb is such a renunciation, it’s a Christ-like move, it’s the wolf’s sacrifice – it’s a love that could never be requited. This wolf that sacrifices its very definition for the lamb, this wolf that doesn’t eat the lamb, is it a wolf? Is it still a wolf?

Waitress: Why does the idea that you are going to eat me up fill me with such pleasure and such terror? It’s to get this pleasure that you need the wolf. The wolf is the truth of love, its cruelty, its fangs, its claws, our aptitude for ferocity.

C. 1 Minute: The waitress looks at a list – it could be compiled from our blog (descriptions of actions, objects, etc.). The customer now has the egg timer and sets it for one minute. The waitress reads the list. As the end of the list, the following line is read:

“Each morning, they would put on the masks and perform their roles for the neighborhood; a signpost to the world that everything was as it should be.”

Both the waitress and the customer put on rhinoceros (or other animal) masks.

D. 1 Minute:
From opposite ends of the stage, on a diagonal, the waitress and the customer alternately yell the following at one another. There should be a gulf of silence between the two lines.

I once had a healer tell me that guilt is a useless emotion. I believe her. But then I begin to feel guilty about not feeling guilty. What is this? Meta-guilt?

Is the guilt greater or lesser because of distance?


E. 1 Minute: On the telephone, Kimi gives directions to audience members. They repeat them to us and we perform them for one minute.

michelle's five minutes

I wrote these on the plane yesterday, where I didn't have access to all our lists.... I'll update later today. **NOW UPDATED*

A. Waitress lifts right hand, stretches out right arm across table, stretches torso/side to reach plate, lifts plate, straightens torso and bends arm in, passes plate to left hand, places right hand on waist. Customer is speaking: "The danger is when you create a world, designed as a whole and for a whole people, made up of two individuals. This world-of-two depends for its survival on a single other person. The world-of-two is immediately surrounded and threatened by death. Death closes in around it tightly. Love immortalizes me. Only that which gives me life can take it away from me. That which gives, gives to enjoy, that which gives to enjoy, gives to fear its loss. Give to lose. The gift and its opposite."

Kimi (on phone) tells audience member "That is incorrect." Audience member repeats "That is incorrect" out loud so everyone can hear. Customer calls out a number and places that amount (tip) on the table. Long silence as Waitress and Customer have stare down. Waitress slams plate down, picks up tip, walks out. Customer looks at audience member and says, "Zoom. Fourteen minutes. Zoom. Another fourteen minutes. Zoom."

B. Waitress lifts plates off table and onto arm, stacking higher and higher. Customer watches, mesmerized. Kimi sings over the phone (into mic?). This is what she sings:

Forward, the Light Brigade!
Was there a man dismay'd?
Not tho' the soldier knew
Someone had blunder'd:
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

C. Customer sings a list of objects for one full minute while eating soup. Waitress directs audience member to intermittently turn on and off a flourescent lamp. Each time, Customer flinches, but keeps singing. The list (in any order):

Chair
Table
Desk lamp
Clipboard
Egg timer
Light switches
Memory cards
Buzzer
Rhinoceros mask
Cups of coffee
Shoe
Horn
Steam
Race
Helmet
Captain
Forest
Staple
Balcony

D. Kimi gives instructions to audience member, who writes them on the restaurant's "specials" board. Another audience member (who has been given a white lab coat) copies the instructions onto a clipboard. Instructions include rules and outcomes. An egg timer ticks throughout. Her instructions include the phrases, "That's correct" and "That's incorrect."

E. Customer and Waitress dance. Audience member (instructed by Kimi? or sparked by an action?) sounds buzzer intermittently. Each time buzzer sounds, there is a misstep. Dance becomes more and more chaotic and clumsy. Customer and Waitress are driven further and further apart.

michelle's 100-word description

[took kimi's and edited slightly... what do you think? i need to send it in! (sorry it took me so long) -mjm]

Based on Stanley Milgram’s experiments in the 1960s, 150v: Milgram’s Tip explores the outer limits of obedience to authority through the lens of a Waitress and a Customer.

Structured as an experiment, the performance asks questions: To what extent are we willing to obey an authority figure, no matter what the cost? What role does the physical distance between two people play in one’s willingness to inflict pain on the other?

In our experiment, the movements and language of a “normal” social situation are repeated over and over to the point of absurdity as the stakes get raised higher and higher, approaching the point of no return.

You Know the Moves

1. Teacher enters space. She wears a nametag labeling her as the “Teacher.” She sits as a desk facing away from the audience at the upstage end of the space and puts on a pair of headphones. She listens. We hear a voice say, “Please be aware that someone might be watching you from a hidden camera, so you must be on your best behavior at all times.” The Teacher nods. “Please turn on the television.” The Teacher nods again and turns on the television in front of her quickly and precisely. The television is hooked to a video camera that is trained on a table filled with glasses behind the Teacher. “Please call the Learner in and flip the switch. If she does not comply with the rules stated beforehand, please press the first button in front of you. The Teacher nods again, calls out, “Go!” and flips a switch.
2. The Waitress/Learner hurriedly enters with a tray piled with ticking egg timers in her left hand and a pitcher filled with water in her right. She is also wearing a nametag, but it says, “Learner.” She reaches the table and begins to fill the furthest glass with water when the Teacher presses a buzzer.
3. The Learner flinches, pulling the pitcher back and dropping the tray full of egg timers. Without turning, the Teacher says, “You didn’t say ‘Mother, may I fill the glasses with water?”
4. The Learner tries to hold the full pitcher of water in her lap while picking up the egg timers and replacing them on the tray (as though the pitcher can never be placed on the floor or the table). Water has spilled on the Learner’s dress. She stands up carefully with the pitcher back in her right hand and the tray of egg timers (no longer ticking) in her left. She walks to where the Teacher is sitting, holding the pitcher and tray in front of her. She stops and stands very formally with the water spill on her dress. She bends down, looks the Teacher in the eye and says, “Mother, may I fill the glasses with water?”
5. The Teacher drops her gaze, motions to the headphones and some distant indeterminate space, and whispers, “I’m really sorry. The researcher told me I had to do it. If she were here I could argue with her, but I don’t think she can even hear me. I feel really guilty, I mean, I could have been you in this experiment. If you want to switch places … but I think we have to stay in theses roles. You know the moves. Enter the room, stop, say Mother may I fill the glasses with water, proceed after confirmation, and fill glasses C, M, O, T, H, D, R, K, W, V, Q, A, L, E, and P, in that order. You know the moves.” The Teacher looks around nervously. "I don't think we really should be talking. Not that I don't want to talk to you. But I think in the rules it states that there should be no contact between us. I'm sorry."

new assignment

Each of us has five separate (but not necessarily consecutive) minutes.

Tell us what happens in each minute. (ie, in minute A... in minute B... etc... Remember, your minutes won't necessarily be one after another)

At some point within the five minutes, include:
- 3-7 objects from kimi's list
- at least 3 sentences of spoken text from anywhere on our blog
- an image of shock
- distance
- a detailed description of one of the 15 actions that you did NOT create (tell us exactly what body part moves first and how, second and how, third... to make up the complete gesture/movement) (these are from brianne and michelle's lists of 7 each, plus kimi's one)
- rules and/or directions
- a list
- something drawn from kimi's photo and/or the stories it inspired
- philosophy
- extremes
- anything else you want to include

The Unfairness of a CCTV

Someone might be watching you, so you must be on your best behavior at all times.
Teacher: The researcher might be watching.
Learner: The teacher might be watching. You rail against the teacher, but you do what she wants, as crazy as it may be.
Teacher: You rail against the researcher, but you zap the learner when the researcher tells you to. She is this omnipresent force that has power over you. She is inside your mind telling you to act against your morals. God seems very far away.
Learner: If the teacher were in the room with you, you could relate to them as a human being. You could become a team against the unfairness of the researcher. You could become the delinquent class.
Teacher: If the researcher were in the room with you, you could argue with them as a human being. You could overpower her. You could trick her. But what’s the point if the learner is so far away and you’re reassured that she’s okay? Easier to just go along with the researcher and do what she says.

responses and thoughts about distance participation

yes... you've both hit on lots of questions/thoughts i've had. i'm trying to come up with an assignment to move us toward some sort of structure at this point - but if either of you has one, feel free to post!

i don't know about foucault and panopticism either. could you (brianne) give us some info on it?

we will actually be (i believe, but i need to double-check) in a small black box theatre. i can ask about sound system. if there was some way to get a phone line amplified over the system, that would be great. or maybe you (kimi) could be on a cell phone and we could give the phone to people in the audience. you could give them instructions to pass along to us. then the whole audience wouldn't necessarily hear you, but various random ones would.

Unfamiliar

No, sorry. What's it about?

Foucault and Panopticism

Are you all familiar with this? It seems to me that we have been talking around it.

guilty distancing

I like the question of distance and guilt as well. I have been thinking about this lately. I live quite far from my family and, as people age and grow ill, not being there is something that is difficult for me. And yet, I don't know that I really do what to be there. The guilt is really huge. So in this sense the distance and guilt become inextricable from one another. But what would the guilt be like if I were in the same room? Is the guilt I am manifesting thousands of miles away real? Is it a result of not have a tangible understanding of what is going on in my absence? Does presence negate that guilt? Does my posting this now help me feel less guilty that I have not been participating to the degree that I would like on this project? Does it make me feel guilty that I am not doing other work I should be doing? Do people understand that I feel this? Do they need to? The question of what distance does to guilt is a big one. What does this have to do with Milgram?

I once had a healer tell me that guilt is a useless emotion. I believe her. But then I begin to feel guilty about not feeling guilty. What is this? Meta-guilt?

Perhaps these writing are used and layered over movement that deals with a different concept we have been talking about.

Distance learning

I think that guilt plays a huge role in learning lessons of how we should interact with other people. Guilt occurs when we feel as though we have violated our moral code, such as when we give electric shocks to a person to the point that they have a heart attack. The question is … when does our guilt grow so large as to motivate us to act?
I really love how you’ve tied together this question of distance to the reality of the distance between all of us participating in this project. It really relates to the way global communication is increasing. Think global, act local? My guess is that guilt grows with the physical closeness of the learner. I think Milgram or someone else did an experiment like this at one time. People were a lot less likely to deliver the shocks if the learner was in the room with them. I think that making the researcher farther away would create the same effect. I could see people trying to trick the researcher … pretending to have pushed the button when really they hadn’t. So … physical closeness can not only mess with our own moral code, but it can also trump authority.
I think it’s a great idea to use my distance from the two of you as part of the project. I don’t know logistically about performing … we never asked for a room with wifi or a good sound system. I don’t know if a speakerphone on a cellphone is a good option … probably not loud enough? I also have to say I’m not a great performer, but I’m willing to try. It doesn’t seem quite right if I pre-recorded my dialogue.
I think we need an assignment!

musings of a recently absent artist

michelle has been missing for days. she said she would post assignments. she hasn't responded to kimi's fabulous description of this project. she hasn't responded to brianne's great posting of various texts from days ago. michelle just disappeared.

if michelle were part of the milgram experiment, would she be ZAPPED? would she be told to ZAP someone else? what role does guilt play in learning?

what role does distance play in all this? we're all on here, online. we can all get online relatively easily. in that sense, we aren't very far apart at all. but geographic distance seems to present some obstacles.

how does that relate to the distance between the researcher and the teacher in milgram's experiments? what about the distance between the teacher and the learner (and the fact that they can't see each other)? is the guilt greater or lesser because of distance? would that guilt shift or change once a different person is in the room? is the obedience to rules affected by distance? ie, the teacher is closer to the researcher, so does what the researcher says. what if the learner was in the room with the teacher instead, and the researcher could only give instructions via intercom or headset? would that change the choices of the teacher? would the teacher be swayed by her proximity to the learner, rather than to the teacher? how will this process change once brianne and i are actually in the same room with one another? and how will kimi's involvement change/modify/be affected by the fact that she isn't in that room with us?

and one final thought: kimi, could you perform with us via headset? (this would allow us to actually play with the idea of distance) then, suddenly, we go from a two-person performance to a performance of three plus audience.

characters: researcher, teacher (customer), learner (waitress), rhinoceros
performers: kimi, brianne, michelle, audience

what do you think?

The Charge of the Light Brigade

Excerpt from Alfred, Lord Tennyson's "The Charge of the Light Brigade"

"Forward, the Light Brigade!"
Was there a man dismay'd?
Not tho' the soldier knew
Someone had blunder'd:
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charge_of_the_Light_Brigade

Photo Assignment Response

They loved to watch the bus go by. Day after day they would move to the front stoop of the orphanage and watch it pass by. Zoom. Fourteen minutes. Zoom. Another fourteen minutes. Zoom. For at least two hours every day after school. Today they decided to put on their masks. They usually came home with a different craft from school. Sometimes it was a macaroni necklace, sometimes a paper hat. Today it was a mask.

Waving at the bus driver, who they felt they knew by this point, they wondered if this would be the day that someone stepped off and came to take them to their new home. But, then again, they wanted someone who came in a car not someone who had to ride the bus. They were sure their real parents drove a car, or had a driver that drove their car and took them wherever they needed or wanted to go.

Jenny, Max, and William are biological siblings, dropped off at the orphanage when they were young - so young that William, the oldest, can hardly recall that day. Or at least this is the general story they tell people. This was part of the game they played - tricksters in all aspects of life. There is no documentation verifying their blood relation.

Kimi's 100 word description

Okay ... there are a lot of things missing from this description, but I tried to make it as flashy as possible and it's only 98 words. I sort of focused on the question of distance since that seemed concrete, but I'm totally open to changing that.


“150v: Milgram’s Tip” is a performance structured as an experiment that asks the question: Does the physical distance between two people determine whether or not one is willing to inflict pain on the other at the request of an authority figure? How close is close enough? In our experiment the movements and language of a “normal” social situation are repeated over and over to the point of absurdity as the stakes get raised higher and higher. Join us as we pass the point of no return in our investigation into the relationship between the individual and the community.

hey all -

just got home. will be getting the assignments done when i get up in the morning - so if you want to post one, michelle, go ahead. my brain is mush. i will also try a 100 word thing tomorrow too if i can...can you send what you have? more later.

sos! need description!

Okay, I'm stuck. I've been trying to write our 100-word description, but I get all tangled up in words like "authority," "obedience," "rules," "Milgram," "repetitive gesture," and "Waitress" that I don't know what order to put them in. Try throwing in "Rhinoceros," "love," and "chaos theory" and things can get really dicey.

I can usually make something sound good (for marketing! yeah! come to our show!) but if either of you could get something basic down for me to work with I'd much appreciate it.

I know I also didn't post an assignment today... didn't want to overwhelm Brianne, who is still working on the last one, so I'll post tomorrow. Don't worry, I'll try to keep it simple!

Or maybe this IS the assignment: Describe our project in enticing terms, no more than 100 of them.

Kimi's Photo Response

Billy named himself King of the Neighborhood and Margaret quickly named herself Queen. Julia wanted to be the Princess, but Billy wanted her to be the Henchman. She argued that she couldn’t be the Henchman because she was a girl. Everyone knows Henchmen are boys. Billy relented, but only if she went to Jail for five minutes. Jail was the frightening hole below the stairs where the trash cans hid. Billy knew Julia was afraid of Jail, but she wanted to be Princess so badly that she agreed. After the five minutes were up and her tears had dried Billy let her wear a pretty dress so that everyone would know she was a Princess.
King Billy, Queen Margaret, and Princess Julia all wore masks so that the kids in the neighborhood would know they were special. The game that King Billy favored was Mother May I? Watching from the top of the stairs, he would listen to the requests of his courtiers. The closer they got to the stairs, the harsher their punishments. Many children were sent to Jail. Charlie, the boy that no one liked, was there for a full fifteen minutes!
As dusk was falling Princess Julia began to take off her mask because she couldn’t really see what was going on. King Billy became livid and ordered her back to Jail. Tired and hungry, Princess Julia complained that as the King’s brother she ought to get special treatment. The masks were stupid. King Billy was stupid. She ripped off the mask and threw it on the ground. King Billy screamed at her and tried to drag her down the stairs, but she squirmed out of his grasp and ran inside to their Mother to complain. King Billy was sent to his room without supper.

michelle's photo response

Kimi, great photo. Here's my quick response...

"Playing House"

Mike and Mia always got to play the Mom and Dad, because they were the oldest. Mike knew the moves. He would survey the neighborhood cooly, and speak without looking at anyone else, the way fathers with real authority would.

"Looks like the Jamisons are going at it again," he'd say, as they watched a chair fly across the space framed by their neighbors' bedroom window. Or, "I'll have to get myself one of those," as Max walked by, showing off his new watch. Mike would shift his weight to the other foot with great gravity, and look off into the distance, deep in thought.

Mia would stand behind him, supportively, as she had seen mothers do. She would smile at passersby, and nod in agreement to anything Mike would say. Sometimes she would gently pat his shoulder.

Ama tried to keep up. She knew the moves, but not as well. She would break into giggles at the wrong time, or hop up and down on one foot when she was supposed to be looking seductive. She wasn't very good at wearing the mask. It always fell off, or would come down over one eye. This is why, Mike and Mia explained, she never got to play the mom.

Except that never made any sense to her. Their own mom would often break into giggles while she was doing her hair, at some private thought or memory. She would sometimes hop up and down on one foot when excitedly greeting their father. Her love was expressive, jubilant, childlike.

And their father, in turn, never had the right watch. He looked at their mother way too often and too respectfully during conversations (he even listened, enraptured, to her stories). Theirs were not the mom and dad of the TV commercials, or even the ones they saw next door.

So Mia and Mike would try to create that normalcy, that structure. Each morning, they would put on the masks and perform their roles for the neighborhood; a signpost to the world that everything was as it should be.

But Ama, too young to understand, could never keep up. They usually tried to ignore her, hoping that, with time, she would eventually learn the rules.

waitress/customer actions

I was thinking we would each come up with our own ways of doing these gestures, so Brianne, both you and I should arrive in a couple of weeks with our own versions of these (all 15). Don't worry for now about us doing them exactly alike. In fact, I have some ideas of follow up assignments to break them down even more. I'll send one tomorrow. :)

Great start. Here are mine. I did 3 for the waitress and 4 for the customer.

Waitress

1) hand in an order to the cooks
2) open tray stand and set down tray
3) pick up dropped pencil

Customer

1) signal for check
2) gesture “no more coffee”
3) stare at menu
4) leave table, remember tip, come back and leave tip

Brianne,
I really enjoyed reading your posting. Interesting how Cixous equates love and pain whereas before we were thinking about pain and discipline. What is that point where two strangers fall in love and begin to fear loss? This makes me think of the idea we mentioned a long time ago about loss bringing a community together. This seems somewhat tangential to Milgram's experiment since he was dealing more with societal rules that govern our behavior when we have no pre-existing realtionship to the other person.
I chose the photograph somewhat randomly. I liked the way the children are wearing masks, thereby distancing themselves from each other and us as observers. However, isn't it interesting that one girl is in the process of taking the mask off or putting it on? The games that children play prepare them for life ... the rules can be arbitrary and they can be cruel, but they must be followed or one must suffer the consequences.

Photo Assignment

Photo Assignment: Describe the game that these children are playing and their relationship to one another.

Waitress Actions

1.) Wipe up a spot on the table (more space to cover each time)
2.) Pick up dropped change (more change each time)
3.) Write orders on a pad (more to write each time)
4.) Reach over customers to deliver food (farther each time)
5.) Hold lower back (as if aching - can get more intense throughout)
6.) Fill condiments on the table (more and more condiments each time?)
7.) Carry tray and fill water at the same time

So these are pretty much basic now...but I think we can play with making them really small, or really big, and stylize them if needed. I have been playing, just not sure how to describe them other than this. Plus, maybe this vague list will spark something in someone else.

assignment clarification

Thanks for the objects, Kimi!

Brianne - once you have your seven actions, can you post descriptions of them here (they can be titles of the actions like "carrying a heavy stack of dishes," or detailed descriptions like "right arm goes up and down twice while three steps are taken forward," or however you would like to do it). I'll post my seven, too.

Then we'll go from there!

I like the text you posted. Today is my busy day so I just skimmed, but I'll read it more closely later.

Brianne contributes...finally

OK - I am trying to give a bit of time to this everyday...just a bit until the weekend when I can give chunks. I will work on some waitress "moves" - with my long line of experience this should be fun.

I am not exactly sure where we are taking this, but I have been thinking about tipping points in terms of process philosophy like that of Bergson, Deleuze, Cixous, etc. (probably because I am knee deep in dissertation ideas and kind of geek out on these three). In any case a singularity, or a place where the flow of life switches quickly to because some other quality, is an interesting place. I could talk about this philosophy more, and would love too, but for now, here are some excerpts from some writing that I think address the tipping point interestingly. The first is from Helene Cixous in her essay "Love of the Wolf":

The landscape of that age is one of anguish and nostalgia. The little girl is running. You can’t tell if she’s running away. Or if she’s lost. If she’s running after the wolf. Or if the wolf is running after her.
One day, I don’t know when, it was decided to call love a set of strange, indescribable physical phenomena, is it pain – but from the moment that the name is given to that burning in one’s breast, the violence of the strangeness is interrupted and the ancient horror, hidden behind the new word, begins to be forgotten. Let’s go back to before language, let’s go back to that disturbing age, the age of myths and of folk tales, the age of stone, of fire, of knives. Before language there is the fire that bites but doesn’t kill, the evil that, like all pain, separates us, the dehiscence that opens in us closed organs, making us seem strange to ourselves – and all that begins with: “when you don’t say anything to anybody – that’s it – it’s love.”
Joyfully you become incomprehensible – two strangers together. You begin to adore a god that nobody else bows down to. A very powerful and very fragile god, very threatening and very threatened. Nobody else believes in you but me.
But the amorous break also speaks of the danger of winning. The danger is when you create a world, designed as a whole and for a whole people, made up of two individuals. This world-of-two depends for its survival on a single other person. The world-of-two is immediately surrounded and threatened by death. Death closes in around it tightly. Love immortalizes me. Only that which gives me life can take it away from me. That which gives, gives to enjoy, that which gives to enjoy, gives to fear its loss. Give to lose. The gift and its opposite.
It is on the basis of love that one recalls mortality. We are mortal only in that high region of love. In ordinary life we are immortal, we think about death, but it doesn’t gnaw at us, it is down there, for later, it is weak, forgettable. But as soon as I love, death is there, it camps out right in the middle of my body, in daylight, getting mixed up with my food, dispatching from the far off future its prophetic presence, taking the bread out of my mouth. It’s because I love the beloved more than I love myself, you are dearer to me than I am to myself, you are not me, you don’t obey me, I was sure that I was once myself immortal, otherwise I couldn’t live, I live only on that assurance, but what about you?
I do not order your immortality. I can no longer live without you. That need overwhelms us. That’s why anguish bursts forth: because the need pushes us toward the realization – no matter what, yes, I must die.
There is no greater love than the love the wolf feels for the lamb it doesn’t eat. The other side of the scene is the paradoxical refined magnificent love of the wolf. It’s not difficult for the ewe to love the lamb. But for the wolf? The wolf’s love for the lamb is such a renunciation, it’s a christ-like move, it’s the wolf’s sacrifice – it’s a love that could never be requited. This wolf that sacrifices its very definition for the lamb, this wolf that doesn’t eat the lamb, is it a wolf? Is it still a wolf?
Why does the idea that you are going to eat me up fill me with such pleasure and such terror? It’s to get this pleasure that you need the wolf. The wolf is the truth of love, its cruelty, its fangs, its claws, our aptitude for ferocity. Love is when you suddenly wake up as a cannibal, not just any old cannibal, or else wake up destined for devourment.

This next bit is from a script I recently wrote inspired by Deleuze's notions of deterritorialization and becoming animal:

To escape territory or at least territory as we are accustomed to it. Does this mean entering a new territory? Perhaps this is how we deterritorialize. At first, at least. To baby step is leaving one’s own territory. Like the foreigner who leaves their homeland to live in another. Always remaining fractured a bit. Now an outsider to their home and yet an outsider to their new place. And still not knowing what is home. A decentered body belonging nowhere but to the self as a constantly changing thing. But still accountable to that which is outside of it. But this foreignness inside of each of us exists and we can only grow and change when we allow it to recur, frightening us perhaps, causing anxiety at the sublimated becoming not so. But this is how we learn to become animal. Perhaps. To leave the laws that we have known, or to leave in the sense of strict adherence, in favor of being unbound, unchained to a place, to a space. Actively seeking this change. Knowing that it will never be the same and there is no turning back. To constantly let it move and reconstitute us as more.

Does this spark anything? I would be happy to keep down this road if others are interested....we can use any of this text, cut it up, keep it solid, rearrange, reassign, etc. Perhaps it could be a way to create different voices to be layerd upon one another in the piece....the philosophical ponderings meets the waitress and the change one another or something like that.

Thanks for those new suggestions, Michelle. I think we're at a point where it would be best if you and Brianne just try things out and see what feels right and what doesn't. Perhaps then we can work more with the language? (Though I do like your idea of writing stuff and deleting parts.)
I like the idea of involving the audience. I think it's important to put them in the supposed position of power (as the Teacher). In the Waitress/Customer dynamic the Customer supposedly has more power, so it seems as though the Waitress ought to be the Learner and the Customer the Teacher. However, this issue of tipping doesn't seem like an immediate enough punishment (unless it is about zapping people when they don't tip enough, which requires the Waitress be the Teacher).
I don't know that discipline necessarily equates pain. We're trying to train a puppy right now and we're trying to use a lot of positive reinforcement. I suppose discipline is putting off immediate gratification for some future reward (people will think better of you, you will get a treat, you won't end up trying to do a ton of work at the last minute).
If we went with the subway model I could see one of you approaching audience members over and over again. Asking them for things? You increase tension by asking for simple things at first, such as programs. Then you ask for pieces of clothing. Finally you ask for cell phones. When the Learner does not receive the thing being asked for, she gets an electric shock. This kind of makes the audience the Teacher.
I could also see a game of memory ... perhaps the Learner is presented with an extremely complicated food order and is asked a bunch of questions relating to that. (The person sitting at table 1 on the right has a food allergy to wheat gluten, the person sitting on the left at table 2 is vegan, etc.etc.) Or perhaps it is a paragraph about rhinoceroses. (Where do they live, what do they eat, etc).

Objects

1. Chair
2. Table
3. Fluorescent desk lamp
4. Clipboard
5. Dishes
6. Computer
7. Telephones
8. Name cards ("Teacher," "Learner")
9. Egg timer
10. Series of light switches
11. Game of memory flash cards
12. Buzzer
13. Rhinoceros mask
14. List of words
15. Cups of coffee

responses and assignments

Kimi - good thoughts. I like the idea of a repeated scenario where one factor gradually changes each time. I wonder if the proximity of the teacher/learner is part of what changes each time... starting at an extreme distance and ending on top of each other (literally, or at least really in each others' space), maybe?

re: "pain = discipline / discipline = pain?"
I was wondering how we equate the two. Can('t) discipline be non-painful?

Totally mixing some things we have mentioned into one scene... does the waitress have to serve the customer boiling frog soup? does the waitress ask the customer for a seat on the subway? does the scene take place on a subway, instead of in a restaurant (see nyt articles I just posted), or is that too complicated? do we involve a rhinoceros?

Other thoughts about character: we only will have Brianne and I. So, could we involve audience members? Do we pull volunteers to be researchers? (Give them instructions to tell us to keep going.) Or have them be the teacher/customer?

Or is the waitress the teacher, trying to teach the customer to leave a larger tip? (Zap! Too low!) Or is the customer the teacher, leaving a low tip to teach the waitress that she shouldn't have (dropped the spoon, voted for Obama, mouthed off, walked too slowly, chosen the wrong job)?

Since Brianne asked for directives/assignments, here is something to start with, to get us started. Brianne and I should each do the following:

Develop seven possible actions for a waitress or customer that can be repeated and modified over time (like Kimi's idea of carrying heavier stacks of dishes). If we each do 7, plus the stacks of dishes, that gives us 15 options to choose from... seems an appropriate number for our 15-minute piece dealing somewhat with 150volts.

Also, Kimi, could you come up with a list of 15 objects that we could use?

What about language in this piece? I noticed the people in the Brown youtube sometimes couldn't speak at all and other times were quite verbal. What if we would each write something that we then go in and erase some of the words? Begin to play with the language that way? We could also pull things from the articles... thoughts?

some links

I just found articles on reenactments of another Milgram experiment... Interesting stuff:
subway experiment article 1
subway experiment article 2

Some links to other sources we've mentioned (so we have them all in one place):

Recent reenactments:
Jerry M. Burger article
Darren Brown you tube

Recent articles from New York Times:
july 2008
dec 2008
response letter

also, this

This talk of tipping points and the Milgram experiment make me think of supercooled solutions in chemistry. These are liquids that are cooled well below their melting points. When a seed crystal is introduced, they suddenly solidify. Bear with me and I’ll try to explain the relation in my mind between thermodynamics and social dynamics.

The interesting and frightening thing about the Milgram experiment is that there WAS NO tipping point. I’m sure that all of these people honestly believed that it is wrong to hurt others. The conditions just didn’t exist for them to make that decision to stop pressing the button.

While this is somewhat disappointing, I don’t believe it’s completely damning. The seed for change may not have to be a single strong individual who is able to face down authority. Perhaps it is a community of people who are able to communicate with one another and make decisions together. How would the Milgram experiment change, I wonder, if you had such a group of people making the decision whether or not to press the button? I am not saying that the numbers would be perfect, but I have a feeling that the odds would increase that they would stop.

I think that for many people the tipping point between healing and depression is the same thing … human connection. Part of why Obama’s campaign worked so well is that he brought so many people together. Our little group is a microcosm of the greater community. In an earlier message I mentioned chaos theory in connection to how every decision, no matter how small, leads to a whole host of other unexpected (large scale) results. But I also seem to remember something from chaos theory that dealt with this issue of scale and how small things are reflected in larger things. A tiny grain of sand is in some way related to the mountain on which it sits. But I think my knowledge of these things is seriously out of date and was only cursory to begin with, so I might be way off.

Nevertheless, the thought is true: Every attempt at human connection and communication can lead to great social change. All collaborative art projects are therefore inherently political.

catching up

Kimi, thanks so much for getting some of our old emails uploaded. I'm going to upload just a few other thoughts that I didn't see on here (hope I'm not duplicating) before moving forward with some more thoughts...

We talked about tipping in restaurants:

"Tipping" - as in, at a restaurant. For example, here's an inane quote in relation to tipping less: "If the rich reduce spending it will ripple through the economy and the people that supported Obama will be out of jobs." Quoted here: http://drhelen.blogspot.com/2008/10/should-you-tip-less-in-obama.html

also: should you tip less in a recession?

(response):
Interesting idea about "tipping." I like the idea of a waitress being the main character. Have you heard of a book called "Waiting." I haven't actually read it yet, but a friend of mine who is a waitress likes it ... about people in service industry who are "waiting" to do something else with their lives.

A couple other thoughts we put out there:

I've also had a difficult year, and have been thinking a lot about what "tips" us toward healing, or in coming together as a community - which can sometimes be the difficult times in life. But at the same time, we are alienated in difficult times - and can feel "tipped" towards desperation, depression, giving up... something around this theme of loss/grief/difficulty and how we deal with it (and can tip one way or the other) is mulling around in my head.

(and)...

I have been thinking about art and activism (the theme this year) and what I have been most interested in is in process. So the way that you put something together is inherently political…you don't have to do identity politics and write a show about an "issue" to be engaging political questions. I think this is something that the Goats talk about and it is also something I have been interested in through a lot of the philosophy I have been reading over the last year or so. By embracing a process that is one of acceptance, and respect, and becoming or not dictating what WILL come of the art you are making, but rather allowing the connections to happen, you are engaging in something political. I'm not sure how this would work. But in terms of tipping points there seems to be something here that I can't quite articulate. Something like if you trust this process you will encounter many tipping points to embrace that will allow you to go in new directions.

I am reminded of the University of South Carolina production of Ionesco’s Rhinoceros a number of years ago. Like Milgram’s experiment, Rhinoceros was created in response to the atrocities in World War II. The set for the production was a streetscape painted on several spandex panels. As the play progressed and more and more people turned into rhinoceroses, the set stretched up and up, distorting the image and increasing the sense of tension. Another play that comes to mind is Sartre’s No Exit, where hell is other people.
I like your idea of the voltage increasing gradually over the fifteen minute performance (rather than quickly rising at the end.) I also like your ideas of sounds. I think that electric lights make the most sense. I can see fluorescent lights creating an underground lab sort of feel. It would be interesting if the rest of the environment were strangely realistic, as though they are trying to recreate the world in a lab. At first I was thinking it could be a restaurant, where the Learner is the waitress and the Teacher is a customer. Each could wear a big label around their neck, “Waitress” and “Customer.” The Researcher would still be a person in a white coat.
However, I remembered that a huge factor in the Milgram experiment was the physical distance between the Teacher and the Learner. The likelihood of the Teacher stopping greatly increased if the Learner were in closer proximity. This seems important. The experiment itself seems to prove the futility of getting people to question authority. Humans are social creatures, that’s part of what makes us function. But perhaps some good would come of getting people to stop and think more carefully about the people they are hurting, as though they were in the room with them. I guess it’s the same thing and still futile. I don’t know. Our need to respect authority trumps our need to respect our own morals unless the result of our actions is right there in front of us. Is this what you meant by pain=discipline?
We could make a scenario that gets repeated over and over with a single factor getting changed gradually (like proximity of the Learner). This would make it very experiment-like. (The Milgram experiment seems to necessitate three people. How do we get around this?)
I tried to imagine setting up some sort of test for the waitress to complete … such as carrying heavier and heavier stacks of dishes. But even if the Teacher were behind a window watching the Learner, I felt like this would be too close. Knowing whether the Learner completed the task or not would require visually watching her. I thought some more about cases in modern life where there is a real distance and disconnect which perhaps leads to dehumanization. Tech support people from other countries seem appropriate. I could see the Teacher and the Learner getting introduced initially, but then all the Teacher sees of the Learner at first is the response on the screen of a computer. Next level: the Teacher talks to the Learner on the phone. Then finally the Learner is sitting next to the Teacher at the same computer? Perhaps this is too literal. I do like the idea of making the piece more about movements and gestures.

I did know about the book... I enjoyed reading it, so if you have time I'd recommend it - but I don't think we would need to reference it, necessarily.

Today I did a little scribbling at a coffee shop with some ideas. I wish I could just scan in my notes - not that they'd make sense, necessarily, but they aren't very linear, so it's hard to put them into a linear email message. I will attempt to do so anyway. Sorry it's sort of a mess, but maybe this can get some thoughts going:

** gradual increase to ridiculous/terrible extremes (movement and structure concept?)
(frog in boiling water concept... doesn't jump out if it goes up by increments)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog

- discipline = pain? pain = discipline?

- is the pain worse for the receiver or the giver of pain - particularly when the implementer isn't doing it completely voluntarily?
--> receiver of "pain"... we see kicking back, reading a newspaper, eating a sandwich, every once in awhile making the sounds of pain (obviously a performance, but sounds real)
--> giver of pain ... see this person in actual physical pain (anguish from having to inflict pain) but trying to behave calmly
--> receiver of shocks perhaps only feels actual pain when they realize that someone is capable of harming them this way
--> both giver and receiver - anger at researchers? anger at each other for their parts in the process? showdown in the debrief room?
(see previous article on debriefing - most recent replication of the experiment)

- kimi's statement "there was no tipping point" ... ?? (i find this intriguing, but not sure how to use it)

- sounds: buzzing, kachunk of "on"/shock, cries to stop, silence

- lights: flashing? one broken bulb? lamp going on and off? shadows? candles (no electricity)?

- slowly drowning a doll in sand (or water) (or something else)

- structure idea: 15 minutes broken down into 15 volts per minute - reaching 150 at the very end...

OR:

minute 1 = 10v
min 2 = 20v
... (stay relatively regular until...)
min 7 = 80v
min 8.5 = 100v
min 10 = 125v
min 12 = 150v
rapidly speed up to 650v by 15 minutes

(increasing multiples... graph...)

** represent the above visually, physically, aurally

- can we pull movement from graphs of voltage somehow? or from the equipment that was used?

- what was i supposed to do? say no? surely researchers (my boss, my mother, my friend, my teacher, my father, the president, the school system, the bank) wouldn't tell me to do something that would hurt someone else. they are responsible. they've got my back. i can trust them to set the parameters, and as long as i stay within them, everything will be fine. they have done their research. (they = food packing industry, our politicians, the people organizing this event, the guards, the lawyers, my therapist, my pastor...)

- "interviews" with the participants?

QUESTIONS:
- how to avoid the didactic/obvious? ... what is/are the question(s) we're asking?
- what is our environment?
- format: lecture, dialogue, scene, parallel monologues, movement/gesture?
- brianne and i could develop parts of this on our own and then put them together/overlap/interrupt... and/or we could all give each other assignments/directives...
- or we could each be responsible for certain minutes of the time (for example: kimi responsible for minutes 1-3, 5-6 and 11-13; michelle responsible for minutes 3-4, 8-11 and 14-15; brianne responsible for minutes 4-5, 6-8, and 13-14)... (or decide randomly)

thoughts? ideas? responses? nay-saying?

150v: Milgram's Tip Final Proposal

Project Description
Milne, Maeda, Waychoff

"150v: Milgram’s Tip" (working title), a performance that will be created over the next month through the collaboration of artists in three different states (Louisiana, South Carolina and Indiana), is an inquiry into the recent replication of Stanley Milgram's obedience experiments.

Milgram's experiments in the 1960s, and Jerry M. Burger's replication of those experiments in 2006, asked research participants to administer what they believed to be electric shocks to others at varying levels, noting at which levels (tipping points) participants said "no" to the authority figures dictating these actions. Most participants never actually refused, despite the apparent pain they were causing another person from the shocks. For many of these participants, 150 volts was the “point of no return;” by this point they either stopped or were highly unlikely to ever stop.

Using these experiments as a starting point, we will ask questions and creatively reflect on obedience, pain, and willingness to inflict pain in a range of circumstances. From these questions and our reflections on them, we will create objects, writing, movement and other elements that will culminate in a 15-20 minute, two-person performance.

We share a belief that our collaborative process is inherently political. The geographic distance we are working across symbolizes the way any artists work at creative distances, whether acknowledged or not. Through embracing this distance (both geographic and artistic), we respect difference and find ways to bridge, but not erase, it. By embracing a process that is one of acceptance, respect and complexity rather than dictatorial predetermination and direction, the final structure of our performance will ultimately reflect these politics. Our process is thus one of embracing any potential tipping points as we go, making decisions that will carry us in unexpected directions that none of us would have discovered on our own.

This talk of tipping points and the Milgram experiment make me think of
supercooled solutions in chemistry. These are liquids that are cooled
well below their melting points. When a seed crystal is introduced, they
suddenly solidify. Bear with me and I'll try to explain the relation in
my mind between thermodynamics and social dynamics.
The interesting and frightening thing about the Milgram experiment is that
there WAS NO tipping point. I'm sure that all of these people honestly
believed that it is wrong to hurt others. The conditions just didn't
exist for them to make that decision to stop pressing the button. While
this is somewhat disappointing, I don't believe it's completely damning.
The seed for change may not have to be a single strong individual who is
able to face down authority. Perhaps it is a community of people who are
able to communicate with one another and make decisions together. How
would the Milgram experiment change, I wonder, if you had such a group of
people making the decision whether or not to press the button? I am not
saying that the numbers would be perfect, but I have a feeling that the
odds would increase that they would stop.
I think that for many people the tipping point between healing and
depression is the same thing . human connection. Part of why Obama's
campaign worked so well is that he brought so many people together. Our
little group is a microcosm of the greater community. In an earlier
message I mentioned chaos theory in connection to how every decision, no
matter how small, leads to a whole host of other unexpected (large scale)
results. But I also seem to remember something from chaos theory that
dealt with this issue of scale and how small things are reflected in
larger things. A tiny grain of sand is in some way related to the
mountain on which it sits. But I think my knowledge of these things is
seriously out of date and was only cursory to begin with, so I might be
way off. Nevertheless, the thought is true: Every attempt at human
connection and communication can lead to great social change. All
collaborative art projects are therefore inherently political.

I think a 15 minute show sounds good.

I'm also terrible at coming up with titles. Here are a few:
The Missing Seed
An Experiment in Questioning
A Primer in Social Dynamics and Supercooling

I'm attaching a more finalized version of the proposal. I tried to simplify and clean it up a bit, but then I also added a bit of information I thought might be important. I gave us the working title of "150v: Milgram's Tip" because 150 volts appears to have been the place by which most participants who were going to refuse at all had already done so. I found a report of Burger's that is pretty interesting to read (and gets into some of what Kimi was bringing up - ie, the effect of others on our decisions): www.apa.org/journals/releases/amp641-1.pdf

Let me know if you have any other comments... Brianne, I talked with Kimi briefly earlier this evening and decided to leave most of her thoughts (which I also really like) as subject matter for us to play with, rather than putting it directly into the proposal.

I'm having trouble deciding what, exactly to include as attachments, so if you have any thoughts let me know. From my own side, I would have a couple of script samples, photos of things I've directed and photos of myself performing. I'll try to do a balance of writing and visuals, and give maybe 3-4 things from each of us... does that sound good?

Just realized it sounds like we're going to replicate the experiments! :S

So, substitute

"x" will begin with the recent replication of Stanley Milgram's 1960's obedience experiments

with

"x" will be created by reflecting on and responding to the recent replication of Stanley Milgram's 1960's obedience experiments by Jerry M. Burger.

Hi Kimi and Brianne,

First, Kimi, your thoughts on working sound great. We can keep working on process as we go...

Below is a very rough outline of a project proposal. It is a little long, so let me know what could go. Also feel free to edit, change, supplement... this is coming out of the few emails we've had, but is synthesized by me - in light of the way we're talking about working, I think it is important to have your voices there too (although I don't want to make it more complicated than necessary... right now we just need to get it turned in).

I could also use:

- Brianne's bio
- any photos/images that you each feel represent your work so I can attach them to the proposal
- a TITLE!! (I'm terrible at coming up with titles) (currently the title is represented by "x" below) (and actually, I'm kind of liking the title being just "x" .... hmm... )
- opinions on length of performance (I'm thinking maybe 15-20 minutes, but I'm open to shorter or longer... they are looking for anything between 12 and 30 minutes)

"x" is a piece that will be created over the next month, across distance, between artists in three states (Louisiana, South Carolina and Indiana). "x" will begin with the recent replication of Stanley Milgram's 1960's obedience experiments. Milgram's experiments, and Jerry M. Burger's replication of those experiments, asked participants in the research to give what they believed to be electric shocks to others, and noted at what levels participants finally said "no" to the authority figures telling them to do so.

We will begin with these experiments as fodder for our work, and will examine questions around and reflections on obedience, pain, and willingness to inflict pain in certain circumstances - including relationship to authority, distancing ourselves from the recipient of the pain, and the role of increment (ie, if the pain is gradually increased, rather than heightened quickly).

We share a belief that our collaborative process is inherently political, in that we are making space for each other even as we bring our own ideas to the table, and that we are working across geographic distance (which can also symbolize the way any artists work at creative distances, whether ackknowledged or not) and will need to find ways to cross that distance. We hope that by embracing a process that is one of acceptance, respect and complexity, rather than dictating the final outcome/structure of our performance before we even begin the process, we will trust and allow connections to happen. We will be embracing tipping points as we go, making decisions that will carry us in unexpected directions that none of us would have discovered on our own.

Kimi, Brianne and I talked the other morning (before I got your message) and decided to focus the proposal at least somewhat on Milgram, letting the project build out from there. I think some of your thoughts could work into that as well (I always like layers!). Brianne, I've included some of Kimi's thoughts below.

I'm having a hellish week within a hellish year, but I'll try to get a rough proposal out to you both in the next 24 hours so we can have some back and forth on it before the deadline (in two days! yikes!).

I am wanting to create material and perform, and that is my understanding of Brianne's interests as well. Kimi, what are you interested in doing for this? Are you interested in joining us in New Orleans for the actual performance, or interested in working at this from a distance only? Do you want to write, create objects and/or other designs, perform, and/or something else? Let me know...

thanks, and more later...
michelle

Interesting idea about "tipping." I like the idea of a waitress being the
main character. Have you heard of a book called "Waiting." I haven't
actually read it yet, but a friend of mine who is a waitress likes it ...
about people in service industry who are "waiting" to do something else
with their lives. Appropriate, I think, given the other ideas you had.
Brianne's idea reminded me a bit of chaos theory ... yup, something that
isn't talked about much these days. But the idea of decisions being made
that affect other decisions reminds me of the whole, drop of water on the
back of a person's hand moving in a different direction every time based
on wind, pulse, etc, etc. Is creation inherently political? How can
someone not be political ... by not making any decisions? Apathy.
Depression?
Okay, more later ...
Cheers,
Kimi

Kimi,

Here is something I sent to Brianne (my friend in Louisiana - she is a performer/writer/scholar in performance studies who I met at the Goat Island Summer School this past summer) about possible ideas for State of the Nation:


I've been thinking about the festival's theme (of "tipping points") a bit, but don't have much solid right now. Some brief thoughts...

1) "Tipping" literally - as in, at a restaurant. For example, here's an inane quote in relation to tipping less: "If the rich reduce spending it will ripple through the economy and the people that supported Obama will be out of jobs." Quoted here: http://drhelen.blogspot.com/2008/10/should-you-tip-less-in-obama.html (by a woman who recommends "pulling a John Galt" in response to the recession and Obama's win... another source of potential inspiration)

Also:
http://www.usnews.com/blogs/alpha-consumer/2008/12/16/should-you-tip-less-in-a-recession.html

... and what tipped our country towards voting the way we did? In INDIANA, for example?! Amazing.

2) I've also had a difficult year, and have been thinking a lot about what "tips" us toward healing, or in coming together as a community - which can sometimes be the difficult times in life. But at the same time, we are alienated in difficult times - and can feel "tipped" towards desperation, depression, giving up... I don't know... something around this theme of loss/grief/difficulty and how we deal with it (and can tip one way or the other) is mulling around in my head.

Brianne responded:

I have been thinking about art and activism (the theme this year) and what I have been most interested in is in process. So the way that you put something together is inherently political…you don't have to do identity politics and write a show about an "issue" to be engaging political questions. I think this is something that the Goats talk about and it is also something I have been interested in through a lot of the philosophy I have been reading over the last year or so. By embracing a process that is one of acceptance, and respect, and becoming or not dictating what WILL come of the art you are making, but rather allowing the connections to happen, you are engaging in something political. I'm not sure how this would work. But in terms of tipping points there seems to be something here that I can't quite articulate. Something like if you trust this process you will encounter many tipping points to embrace that will allow you to go in new directions. I think this could be connected with your number 2 as well as number one somehow. What do you think?

I also mentioned to Brianne an idea about the Stanley Milgram experiments that were recently re-done, finding that people are still as willing as ever to hurt each other when authority tells them to. Here's a link to one article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/29/opinion/29mon3.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=milgram&st=cse

So... what do you think? Are you interested? We'd be creating something short (they are asking for 12-30 minute performances), and probably create much of it from a distance somehow. I just need to get the proposal in by Feb. 1.

Let me know if you are interested/have thoughts... If so, I'll get all three of us in touch and discussing ideas.

much love,
michelle

STATE OF THE NATION V
Art and Performance Festival

New Orleans
March 18 - 23, 2009

A Partnership between Alternate ROOTS, ArtSpot Productions, Mondo Bizarro, MUGABEE, Junebug Productions, New Noise, 7th Ward Community Center, and the NOLA Human Rights Film Festival


--------------- Performance and Visual Art Proposal Form --------------

State of the Nation is an annual multidisciplinary arts festival and bi-monthly series that brings together student, emerging, and professional performing and visual artists from across the United States who are committed to addressing social, political, and economic issues facing the Gulf South. Co-Produced in New Orleans, LA and Jackson, MS annually since 2004, SON has presented the work of over two hundred and fifty dancers, musicians, theater artists, poets, painters, sculptors, filmmakers, activists and educators. Attended by thousands, this festival provides an opportunity to showcase projects and participate in workshops. At its best, it stands as a forum for democracy – a space for the free discussion of current affairs.

This year’s festival will explore the intersection of art and activism through the presentation of original performance, music, film, workshops, visual art installations and site-specific events. It will take place from March 18-23, 2009 at the 7th Ward Community Center, The Studio at Colton and various site-specific locations throughout New Orleans.

------------------------------ More About the Theme -----------------------------

Tipping points are "the levels at which the momentum for change becomes unstoppable" or "the moment of critical mass, the threshold, the boiling point.”

The theme for this year’s State of the Nation Festival is Tipping Point. For all artists who are proposing, we ask that you take this theme into account while envisioning your work. In discussions surrounding this theme, questions that have come up include:

How do we recognize when we’re at a tipping point? Is it possible to retreat from a tipping point? (ex. climate change, economic recession, privatization). When does a phenomenon tip over to become encoded in policy? How can art tip policy? How do we make art that tips people? Or pushes people toward a tipping point? How do we create tipping points that generate lasting positive social change?