75 in a Hat
1969
Performance, 13.5 m x 30.5 cm.
Materials: red silk
Collection: Private Collection.
"My interest first was in the plural structure, just to, I don’t know exactly why that I should make things that men and women can wear at the same time, that’s very interesting socially I think. That in the history of… At least I don’t know of structures where men and women wear the same structure, that people are undifferentiated, their heads stick out or their heads are covered up, this calls a new kind of experience to people, what is clothing? What does clothing mean? What is the legality of a man and a woman wearing the same structure down a New York street. If there are four people in a disc, sixteen feet in diameter, to go into the museum, are you one or are you four? Or if they were 75 in a hat, are you one or are you 75?"
From: James Lee Byars / Antwerp 18 April-7 May 1969, Jef cornelis, First broadcast: VRT 1, 28/11/1969
