Ron Athey News

Ron Athey's First Major Publication - Call for Contributions

2011-09-10T06:29:00.000-07:00

This will be the first ever publication devoted to the work of Ron Athey, a central figure in the development of performance art since the 1980s. Edited by Dominic Johnson, Pleading in the Blood: The Art of Ron Athey will foreground the prescience of Athey’s work, exploring how his visceral, body-based practice foresaw and precipitated the central place afforded to the body in art and critical theory in the 1990s and after. While histories of art, performance, theatre, and subcultures have consistently acknowledged Athey’s major contribution to the development of contemporary cultures, there has never been a dedicated book about him.Pleading in the Blood aims to fill this conspicuous gap.

Developed in close collaboration with Ron Athey, this book seeks to provide a critical overview of Athey’s practice. In his stagings of crisis, sexuality and death in the time of AIDS, Athey calls into question the limits of artistic practice. Athey has been a crucial figure in the development of performance art and body art; club performance; intersections between punk, queer and alternative cultures; sexual politics, specifically in relation to queer practices and the politics of HIV/AIDS; and the representation of religion and ritual.

Why the book needs support

We believe that this book will:

· Introduce new audiences to the work and influence of Ron Athey

· Provide a comprehensive and rigorous overview of Athey’s work for existing audiences

· Contribute to critical discourses about the possibilities and limits of art and interdisciplinarity

· Positively enhance public awareness and understanding of innovative and progressive artistic practice

· Facilitate the acquisition of knowledge, including in the higher education, libraries, and archives sectors, and

· Inform future artistic and critical practices and debates

The Agency and MIT Press have already raised two thirds of the publication’s budget. However, we believe that Pleading in the Blood merits the highest possible standards and be as richly illustrated and as lavishly produced as possible. Your support will strongly enhance those production values and will be a crucially needed step in meeting our collective vision for the book.

The book will track Athey’s work from the 1980s underground through to his influential works for festivals, galleries and museums, which have crucially impacted upon the development of body art, Live Art and experimental theatre. The book will include contributions from distinguished national and international artists, writers and scholars: six newly commissioned chapters on different aspects of Athey’s work; shorter ‘testimonials’ by artists; Athey’s own writings; and extensive full-colour images. Contributors include Amelia Jones, C. Carr, Adrian Heathfield, Lydia Lunch, Dominic Johnson and Patrick Califia amongst many others.

The book will be published in 2012.

http://www.indiegogo.com/Pleading-in-the-Blood-The-Art-of-Ron-Athey

Ron Athey at Borderline Bienalle

2011-07-27T08:42:00.000-07:00

Ron Athey will be performing at the Borderline Bienalle in Lyon, France. Appearing on the Friday the 2nd of September, it will be the first of a series of performances leading up to his 50th birthday in December 2011.

Image by Catherine Opie

St/Sebastian/50 is a new version of the performance Sebastian Suspended from 2000, which was presented internationally in club and art settings. A short clip of the original performance, at Highways Performance Space in Santa Monica, can be viewed here:

http://www.youtube.com/user/ronathey#p/u/1/NQzI9oVOcT4

For more details, pre-registration and a full program, visit:

http://www.borderlinebiennale.tv/

Gifts of the Spirit Documentation

2011-07-11T10:14:00.000-07:00

Gifts of the Spirit: Automatic Writing

Photograph by Roshana Rubin-Mayhew

Documentation from Ron Athey's performance, Gifts of the Spirit: Automatic Writing at Whitworth Hall, Manchester is now availble at http://gallery.2gyrlz.org/gifts/

The performance was presented by 2 Gyrlz Performative Arts, in collaboration with Glorious Trauma and the Centre for the Study of Surrealism and it's Legacies. Preceded by two days of intensive workshops with Ron Athey and Sue Fox, it was presented in conjunction with the conference 'The Queer Theory of the Avant Garde' at Manchester University.

The performance was originally developed during an AiR Project residency at Queen Mary, University of London.

Gifts of the Spirit in Manchester

2011-06-11T09:06:00.000-07:00

2 Gyrlz Performative Arts, in collaboration with Glorious Trauma and the Centre for the Study of Surrealism and its Legacies, is proud to present the Northern debut of “Gifts of the Spirit: Automatic Writing”

A performance installation conceived, scored and directed by Ron Athey with automatic composition and music performance by Othon Mataragas. They will be accompanied by 16 automatic writers, a piano, 6 typists, 4 editors, 1 reader, and a glossolalia chorus. The performance will take place in the historic Whitworth Hall on the University of Manchester campus on Monday June 27th at 7:00pm.

For directions and campus map, please visit www.manchester.ac.uk. Admission is free, but as space is limited, you must reserve a ticket through accessing: http://giftsofthespirit.eventbrite.com/

This event is presented in conjunction with:

The Queer Theory of the Avant-Garde
Organised by the Centre for the Study of Surrealism and its Legacies

27th and 28th June 2011
Kanaris Lecture Theatre, Manchester Museum

Registration for the conference: £15 (including refreshments)
email Joanna.Pawlik@manchester.ac.uk to register.

Gifts of the Spirit was originally devised during an AiR Project Residency at Queen Mary, University of London
www.airproject.qmul.ac.uk

Self Obliteration I & II in Ljubljana, Slovenia

2011-04-03T07:42:00.000-07:00

Self Obliteration I & II was presented on the 31st March 2011 by Galerija Kapelica at T5 Project Space in Ljubljana, Slovenia. All photographs by Miha Fras.

Self Obliteration in Ljubljana

2011-02-05T06:13:00.000-08:00

On the 31st of March 2011 Ron Athey will be bringing his critically acclaimed solo piece, Self Obliteration I & II to Ljubljana, Slovenia with Galerija Kapelica.

The piece has previously been presented in Berlin, Los Angeles, Glasgow and London.

'For those of us who watch – or bear witness, as it so often feels in Athey's performances – it is as if he is trying to obliterate our vision of him with his own bodily fluids...He is perfectly still, like an ancient battered rock: immense, blind and immovable.' - Lyn Garnder, Guardian (UK)

31st March 2011 - 9pm
T5 Project Space
Tobacna 5
Ljubljana

http://www.k6-4.org/?p=47 - Galerija Kapelica website. (Slovenian)

Ron Athey and Kira O'Reilly in conversation this Friday

2010-12-13T06:12:00.000-08:00

Gifts of the Spirit Part 1: Automatic Writing
Photograph by Bobby Whittaker

Untitled (syncopations for more bodies)
Photograph by John Cartwright

This friday, Ron Athey and Kira O'Reillywill be in conversation, discussing their most recent work and experiences asOutside AiR headliners. The talk will be followed by a Q&A session and awine reception, and is free of charge.

Friday 17th December 2010, 6.30pm

QueenMary University of London

ArtsLecture Theatre

ArtsBuilding

MileEnd Road

E14NS

London

For more info on the project:

http://www.airproject.qmul.ac.uk/

Ron Athey in 2011 - Performances, Projects & Events

2010-12-06T10:52:00.000-08:00

Self Obliteration Parts I & II in Barcelona, Spain and Ljubljana, Slovenia

Gifts of the Spirit Part 1: Automatic Writing in Manchester, UK

Resonate/Obliterate London

and

www.ronathey.com

Ron Athey and Kira O'Reilly: Syncopations and Automatic Writing

2010-11-25T07:05:00.000-08:00

17th December 2010

Ron Athey and Kira O'Reilly will present illustrated lectures about their current work, focusing on their recent performances in Outside AiR at Queen Mary University of London (QMUL).

Athey and O'Reilly will also be in conversation together, followed by a Q&A with the audience and a wine reception with the artists.

Both artists presented performances as part of their AiR Project residencies in the Department of Drama at QMUL in 2010. Air Project is co-organised by Dominic Johnson and Lois Weaver, and supported by Arts Council England, East End Collaborations, Live Art Development Agency, Westfield Trust, LCACE and QMI Prospects Fund.

For more info on the project: http://www.airproject.qmul.ac.uk/

The event is FREE and all are welcome. No booking required.

BIOGRAPHIES

Ron Athey has been a practicing artist since the early 1980s. In Athey's touring series such as The Torture Trilogy (1993-95) and Incorruptible Flesh (1997-2008), physical actions stand in as decoys for events too final to repeat: a deep piercing is the arrow in St. Sebastian’s liver, a scalpel cut becomes Philoctetes’ foul gash, a wound that never heals.

Kira O’Reilly is a UK based artist; her practice, both wilfully interdisciplinary and entirely undisciplined, stems from a visual art background; it employs performance, biotechnical practices and writing with which to consider speculative reconfigurations around the body. She is currently AHRC Creative Fellow in QMUL Drama.

17th December 2010 6.30pm

Queen Mary University of London

Arts Lecture Theatre, Arts Building

Mile End Road

E1 4NS

London

United Kingdom

Gifts of the Spirit Part 1: Automatic Writing (A Study and A Score)

2010-11-17T09:25:00.000-08:00

Ron Athey's performance installation at Outside AiR. A cast of 26 generate ecstatic writing around the unfinished text of Athey's memoir, Gifts of the Spirit.

All photographs by Bobby Whittaker.

Outside AiR - Ron Athey's New Performance

2010-11-05T04:49:00.000-07:00

Ron Athey's new performance installation Gifts of the Spirit Part 1: Automatic Writing (A Study and A Score) at Outside AiR has only a limited number of places left for both nights. Book now to avoid disappointment!

Kira O'Reilly 8-9 November 7.30pm £10 (£8)
Ron Athey 11-12 November 7.30pm £10 (£8)

To reserve tickets or for more information contact Rose Sharp r.sharp@qmul.ac.uk 020 7882 5196

Ron Athey at Outside AiR

2010-10-22T02:05:00.000-07:00

Outside AiR is a programme of live performances and events showcasing the work of the Artists in Residence (AiR) at Queen Mary, University of London. Presented every six months, it will also involve established artists in public performances, conversations and special events.

Two high profile and internationally renowned artists Ron Athey and Kira O'Reilly will present new live performances developed for the Great Hall, building on their work as AiR Project Artists in Residence in the Department of Drama at Queen Mary, University of London.

Kira O'Reilly 8-9 November 7.30pm £10 (£8)

Ron Athey 11-12 November 7.30pm £10 (£8)

To reserve tickets or for more information contact Rose Sharp r.sharp@qmul.ac.uk 020 7882 5196