PAID OPPORTUNITY - PART 1

(Live Audition, FEBRUARY 2016)

 

Paid Opportunity was a week long open audition/casting-call for an alleged remake of the film Journey Into Self , held within the Material Situations exhibition in a gallery in Bristol. The work contained three main types of encounter. The first encounter involved me as the artist, as I took to the streets around Bristol to convince people to come back to the gallery and audition for the alleged film in exchange for £5. Like Here Is Where We Meet this encounter was quite personal and intimate and also a great tool for highlighting the unknown performances that counter embarrassment, last seen in 9”.

 

The second encounter was an overtly structured and mediatized affair, as participants that agreed to audition would come back to the gallery and stand in the corner behind a microphone and camera. Once in the correct position each participant would choose to read one of the characters from Read Through (the script adaptation of Journey Into Self ) and proceed to perform that individual role. They were asked just to read that particular character's parts in the order they appeared but in any fashion or style they chose.

 

The third encounter was the monetary exchange, which again took the participant back to a similar position of the first encounter, as they would generally feel uncomfortable now taking the promised monetary payment for their time.

 

It was interesting to see the shift between the three encounters and the ease at which people would embrace the second type much more than the first and the third. Once the human interaction was taken out of the second encounter the participant would tend to relax and function without much awareness despite the fact that they were being asked to perform in front of a camera.