/TEXT/ she translate that was more than an I? Where is the space opening up in this passion, the moment when the participating viewer perceives an image of chaos, as a performance? What is the difference? Could it help an understanding to distinguish between feelings and emotions? Or is it the difference between action and reaction that is crucial? A statement: The viewer should not be forced to react, as that will surely close fields of perception. These fields should not be closed, they should be opened up. In my point of view, a helpful keyword is the term ‘translation’. Metaphors and poetic expressions are the tools of translation. Should the performers be displaying their tools? The tools are figures of transition, at the threshold, restless in their state of misappropriation, having renounced the representation But what do I see in performances that reject translation? They are totally devoid of tools or action. What is left is a meaningless I, trying to rescue itself, but it is long lost in societal manipulation. Maybe something substantial is conveyed here, something that my I is reluctant to see and therefore cannot understand. Put nicely: the I is another. (4) There is a fact which is already mentioned, deferred and yet relating to all my preceding statements: Who is ‘The Third’?, ‘The Other?’ in who’s midst performer and viewer meet, as Martin Buber described it? Who is ‘The Other’?, what is ‘The Other’? A helpful model. In an unspecified place, in an unspecified manner, there is an unknown quantity of people seated, forming a group. Their behaviour is overtly visible. Every single one of them is constantly communicating, demonstrating their dispositions through monologues, infinitely projecting, without ever pausing for an answer. A specific atmosphere is created within an indetermined energetic field of murmur. They all act as social agents in this field of undefined
expectations. There is a single person sitting opposite to the group. Facing them frontally or turned a little sideways, equally expecting something, surrounded by an aura of passivity. There are two defined locations in this oppositeness. Firstly the opposite, secondly a chosen stage (defined broadly, as far as to situations that could be called ‘site specific’). This person shows a different (cultural?) habitus or she/he is only sitting. This, to sit, can be a state of presence that expresses nothing. But it is physically visible, as the group is as well, and this is where it all starts. The atmosphere changes from an undefined into a defined mood and from there into that which is opposing the group as ‘The Other’. By the person seated opposite (from) them, the group is led into mental communication through looks, gestures, patterns of movement etc., and invited to step into the Other (a mental opening of space and time). The tools of this person are her/his performative knowledge, her/his presence, her/his physical and bodily action in performing. The tool of the group is to step out of their habitat, leaving the social communication, to enter into mental communication with this person. In its finest manifestation, the group engages their attention and lets go of their patterns of interpretation in order to be more perceptive (to trespass the threshold of perception). What then really happens inside this Other will never be experienced, it is always a translation. Anyone who attempts to describe it, will fall into the trap of telling stories, fairytales of artistic authentication, patterns of interpretation and empty phrases. Looking back often reveals altered people. The one who looks back is then also the other. Who can explain to me what really happens there? Am I dreaming? I hope that my statements have not burdened any view on performance. In addition, I hope that I have nourished the inappropriate and inevitable urge for performance to be in a state of anarchy. In the implementation of the unavoidable - and this is the only thing that should happen in performance - why-questions should not be asked. In the face of all occurring events they can only be presumptuous.