Interpretive Art Performance...WTF?
This weekend I saw one of the most ridiculous thing in my life; an interpretive art performance by Thomas Buckner, Baritone, in San Francisco. Eliza and I had no idea it was an interpretive art performance because the tickets were free. We were expecting your standard baritone singer accompanied by a pianist. But oh no, the show was much more than that. When they came on stage for the first part of the piece, called “Amazing”, everything seemed normal. “Amazing” is about the struggles of love, a common theme. They had a soprano, a pianist, two percussionists, and Mr. Buckner himself. But as soon as they started, we realized something was very different. For one there was this “dancer” who came out onto the stage very slowly. Wearing a mobster suit with hat, and a very long black wig, yet no shoes and one white glove on one hand. He would move very so slowly, never lifting up his face as to keep it hidden. It was strange, but not too strange. The pianist was playing something that appeared as random noise, as random as it can get from a piano. And with Mr. Buckner’s singing, I was completely lost. The two pieces didn’t seem to fit. Then at some point the percussion guys got into it. One of percussionists played on a drum and the other played on a xylophone. The noise that came from their instruments also didn’t seem to fit with the rest. Almost felt as if they were playing for a Kabuki play. Once all of them were in “rhythm”, the “dancer” started going nuts with bizarre erratic movements all over the place. Maybe I’m highly uncultured, but I was completely lost and baffled. Where was I? Was this really happening? Shouldn’t this be at a coffee shop that no one visits? Maybe this should be at someone’s house rather in public?
When I looked around the audience, everyone looked so serious. Was there something they understood with their well-trained art eyes and ears that I was missing? The whole thing was just so ridiculous. And then everything changed. I looked over to Eliza, and I could see she was thinking the same thing. The moment it became clear to me she was feeling the same way, I had an uncontrollable surge of laughter rise deep from within my belly. At that moment all I wanted in life was to be able to move down the aisle onto the floor where I could roll around in laughter until I hurt from laughing so hard. But I couldn’t, since everyone seemed so serious around us. What instead ensued can be described as uncontrollable shakes from containing the laughter inside. Both of us kept bursting into uncontrollable giggles/shakes every few seconds here and there. It was pure torture. I began sweating profusely, I used my suit to cover my eyes to keep from looking, I bit down on my tongue, I pinched my skin, I tried tapping my feet to a rhythm in my head. All of it was useless. I could not control the laughter. How could no one else feel the same way? Maybe the performance was supposed to cause extreme laughter? Shouldn’t I be real and true to myself, and express my emotions since maybe that was the point of the performance? All I knew was that I wanted to laugh harder than I had ever laughed before.
After that first performance, we were able to calm down. Then probably 30% or more of the audience left. Guess I’m not the only one who is not cultured. Or maybe it was my validation that I’m sane and the performance is insane.
Anyways, afterwards we were intrigued by the nonsense that we stayed a bit more before heading out to dinner (had reservations). We moved away from the general seating area where we could laugh if we needed to. The rest of the performance was also unbelievably ridiculous. But without the crazy dancer and the melodies of the kabuki style percussion, we were able to control ourselves.
When I looked around the audience, everyone looked so serious. Was there something they understood with their well-trained art eyes and ears that I was missing? The whole thing was just so ridiculous. And then everything changed. I looked over to Eliza, and I could see she was thinking the same thing. The moment it became clear to me she was feeling the same way, I had an uncontrollable surge of laughter rise deep from within my belly. At that moment all I wanted in life was to be able to move down the aisle onto the floor where I could roll around in laughter until I hurt from laughing so hard. But I couldn’t, since everyone seemed so serious around us. What instead ensued can be described as uncontrollable shakes from containing the laughter inside. Both of us kept bursting into uncontrollable giggles/shakes every few seconds here and there. It was pure torture. I began sweating profusely, I used my suit to cover my eyes to keep from looking, I bit down on my tongue, I pinched my skin, I tried tapping my feet to a rhythm in my head. All of it was useless. I could not control the laughter. How could no one else feel the same way? Maybe the performance was supposed to cause extreme laughter? Shouldn’t I be real and true to myself, and express my emotions since maybe that was the point of the performance? All I knew was that I wanted to laugh harder than I had ever laughed before.
After that first performance, we were able to calm down. Then probably 30% or more of the audience left. Guess I’m not the only one who is not cultured. Or maybe it was my validation that I’m sane and the performance is insane.
Anyways, afterwards we were intrigued by the nonsense that we stayed a bit more before heading out to dinner (had reservations). We moved away from the general seating area where we could laugh if we needed to. The rest of the performance was also unbelievably ridiculous. But without the crazy dancer and the melodies of the kabuki style percussion, we were able to control ourselves.