When American novelist Jonathan Safran Foer published Tree of Codes, in 2010, it stumped critics. The publication – part book, part sculpture, part poetry – saw Foer write a story not by putting words to paper, but by removing words from another text: Bruno Schulz’s The Street of Crocodiles. The result is a paperback rife with excisions, what choreographer Wayne McGregor calls ‘a beautiful architectural object’.
After reading the book, McGregor became determined to produce this architectural object as a performance, so he choreographed it in creative partnership with Olafur Eliasson, who came up with a visual concept, and Jamie xx, who composed the music. Over the course of a weeklong run, the Park Avenue Armory in New York staged the 90-minute performance that resulted from this coming-together of three people at the top of their artistic fields. Like the book that inspired it, Tree of Codes, as a performance, defies easy category – part dance, part art installation, and part music event.
Eliasson’s set, positioned at the centre of the Armory’s vast drill hall, produces a colourful and kinetic stage. A mirrored backdrop folds into itself, creating a kaleidoscopic effect, while a scrim that divides the stage is both reflective and transparent, allowing dancers on each side of it to be reflected in different ways. In the prismatic lighting and stage colours, audience members will recognise Eliasson’s influence – also on display with an installation before the performance starts that projects the silhouettes of passersby as repeated shadows tinted with the full colour spectrum.
In what has become an ambitiously versatile arts venue, the Armory will round out its 2015 season with an installation by Laurie Anderson and a performance by Marina Abramović with pianist Igor Levit. Throughout it all, work continues on restoring the 19th century building, under the design direction of Herzog & de Meuron.
The book which the performance is based on, by Jonathon Safran Foer, is constructed from the words of another text – Bruno Schulz’s The Street of Crocodiles – to create a hybrid piece that is part novel, part sculpture and part poetry
The backdrop is an overlapped mirror, creating a kaleidoscopic effect which places the performers in a surreal dance with themselves
With the combined efforts of these three artistic heavyweights, the performance begins to mirror the book, becoming a fragmented work that is part dance, part art installation, and part music event
In the prismatic lighting and stage colours, audience members will recognise Eliasson’s influence
Eliasson’s touch was also on display with a pre-performance installation that projects the silhouettes of passersby as repeated shadows tinted with the full colour spectrum
INFORMATION
Photography: Stephanie Berger
ADDRESS
Park Avenue Armory
643 Park Avenue
New York City, NY 10065
-
We'd happily move into this super-stylish New York architecture officeMichael K Chen’s newly expanded Midtown workspace is a calling card for his intuitive style and inclusive approach
-
The Macbeth, an icon of indie sleaze, goes from grotty to gastroAn East End legend meets Portuguese small plates in Jamie Allan’s ambitious revival of a beloved Hackney watering hole
-
Around the world in brutalist interiors – take a tour with this new book'Brutalist Interiors' is a new book exploring the genre's most spectacular spaces; we speak to its editor Derek Lamberton, and ask for his top-three must-sees
-
Richard Prince recontextualises archival advertisements in TexasThe artist unites his ‘Posters’ – based on ads for everything from cat pictures to nudes – at Hetzler, Marfa
-
Out of office: the Wallpaper* editors’ picks of the weekAnother week, another flurry of events, opening and excursions showcasing the best of culture and entertainment at home and abroad. Catch our editors at Scandi festivals, iconic jazz clubs, and running the length of Manhattan…
-
The best Ruth Asawa exhibition is actually on the streets of San FranciscoThe artist, now the subject of a major retrospective at SFMOMA, designed many public sculptures scattered across the Bay Area – you just have to know where to look
-
Orlando Museum of Art wants to showcase more Latin American and Hispanic artists. Do you fit the bill?The Florida gallery calls for for Hispanic and Latin American artists to submit their work for an ongoing exhibition
-
The spread of Butter: the Black-owned art fair where artists see all the profitsThe Indianapolis-based art fair is known for bringing Black art to the forefront. As it ventures out of state to make its Los Angeles debut, we speak with founders Mali and Alan Bacon to find out more
-
Steve Martin wants you to visit The Frick CollectionThe actor has appeared in a video promoting New York’s newly renovated art museum
-
'What does it mean that the language of photography is invented by men?' Justine Kurland explores the feminist potential of collage'The Rose,' at the Center for Photography at Woodstock (CPW) in Kingston, New York, examines the work of over 50 artists using collage as a feminist practice
-
Architect Erin Besler is reframing the American tradition of barn raisingAt Art Omi sculpture and architecture park, NY, Besler turns barn raising into an inclusive project that challenges conventional notions of architecture
