M HKA Ensembles

Installation

Collection: Courtesy the artist.

The installation with a timeline drawn in chalk on school blackboards originates in the performance titled The Bug (After Mayakovsky), a 2022 adaptation of a play by Russian futurist Vladimir Mayakovsky, that García made in collaboration with other artists. This adaptation is a work in progress, using formats such as workshop, collective writing, and theatre. During the Carta Festival 2022 in De Singel in Antwerp, the performance adopted the format of a public rehearsal that allowed for instant feedback from the audience. In Mayakovsky’s bitter but comic play, a soviet revolutionary is frozen in 1929 and reawakens in 1979 – and by accident a parasite accompanies him in this time travel. The adaptation poses questions such as: What happens in a time-lapse of 50 years? How to explain 50 years to someone who spent them in a coma? Is it true that history moves in cycles and there is an eternal return? Could we speak of glitches in this infinite repetition, and could we liken the glitch to The Bug?