I’m off to see ‘Twins: How Do I Know I am Me’ by Angie Hiesel at A Foundation this afternoon with my identical twin sister. We toyed with the idea of wearing the same clothes, but not for very long!
The Bluecoat, who organised the performance were advertising for identical twins for ages and Ruth and I were pretty up for it. Due to some bad communication, we turned up twice for auditions only to find they’d been cancelled, not so bad for me, but a pain in the arse for Ruth who has a very stressful job and had to drive 35 miles for it on her day off… It made me think because after those two attempts, she flat out refused to be involved. To her it was unthinkable to continue with the project after two failed attempts and little apology or compensation (there were expenses paid – after audition stage – but not for time, just for travel). Anyway, a Liverpool-based artist, Laurance Payot, was also looking for identical twins to do a short performance/intervention, so we will be helping her out instead. I think we are both quite happy to share our twin-ness, we know it is useful to people and have filled out book-sized surveys for various university studies each year since we were small.
It’s a difficult situation isn’t it, asking the public to take part in works for free.. especially when rehearsals are involved and the artist is receiving a fee. It must create huge dependance for the artist on people who have no obligation to the work other than an interest and willingness to take part. Not sure I could cope with that stress! I see the plinth gets underway on Monday, will be interested to see how that gets on and whether there are enough people to sustain it for the duration…
