Collaborative and intercultural life performances 

A selection of collaborative life performances with reference to and exploration of concepts of connectedness and disconnection in a broader sense. Between people and their environment, empty and filled, and through situations.

In February 2021, I was a guest artist with pIART in Kumasi, Ghana. The project comprised several segments: two live and video performances in public spaces, as well as a social sculpture workshop. In collaboration with Eric Kofi, I performed the live piece "I can not see - Stay behind" on a pedestrian bridge in the center of Kumasi, Ghana. This was my first time participating in an interdisciplinary collaborative project in Africa.

Curator: Ve-Bene E.K. Fiatsi

The project is supported by crazinisT artisT studiO and Stroom, The Hague, Netherlands.

With Martin Toloko, Marlene G. Prinz, Amudzi Mawuenya, Johannes C. Gerard / Camera: Sammy. A group of people from different cultures and genders waits for the train. The train arrives and the journey begins. But along the way, the train encounters an obstacle: the track is broken. All the passengers and the train driver leave the train, examine the track, and try to repair it. Will they succeed in repairing the track so that the train can continue its journey? This work was realized as part of the pIART project.

Performance project at The Lab Program: Art-Research & Mobility Network, thanks to a collabortation with art studio Frontera Garibaldi, Mexico City, Mexico. Curator Valeria Montana

Conecta-no Conecta’ (Connected-Not Connected) is a performance piece that usually is presented live by myself.

In the context of Mexico City this work has been reframed as a collaborative video-performance made between Johannes and artists Fred Castro (MX), Fey Montalvo ( MX) and Hanna Doucet (FR). At the same time a small booklet was presented over my work in Mexico City :

La perfermance siempre es una fiera que incomodo, que aterrra,queabraza sobre el trabajo de Johannes C. Gerard en la Ciudad de México. Author Valeria Montana, 32 pages (text Spanish/English) May 2019, potentA ediciones, Mexico City, Mexico

The festival took placed on 19th of June 2021.The date is not announced to the public, neither to the artists who created the performances concepts. This non-announcement belongs to the festival concept.

The Nieuwstraat Festival fits in a series of Unnoticed Art Festivals. It balances on the line between public and private. It shows artworks hiding in normality. The language, used to express the works, fits in the average social behavior in public space and, because of that, remained unnoticed to bystanders. Passers-by will observe the actions, but may not recognize them as performance art.

Creating the concepts and executing the works are split. Artists send their concepts more or less as manuals. The chosen works are carried out by a group of (both experienced and inexperienced) volunteers.Creating the concepts and executing the works are split. Artists send their concepts more or less as manuals. The chosen works are carried out by a group of (both experienced and inexperienced) volunteers. These volunteers have a double roll. They are participants as well as audience. They are responsible for realizing the performances in the best possible way and, doing that, they fully experience the works. In fact they become part of it. This way the audience is not excluded but it is actually embedded.

My Performance Concept for the volunteers Nico and Ines

To document by photographic means objects lying on the ground in Nieuwstraat.The objects should not be permanently attached or fixed to the street level.The objects which should be looked for includes everything what is movable. Among others dead inspects, dead birds, paper, plastic pieces, metal objects, feathers, leaf's, lose stones, broken glass, cigarettes stubs, garbage, mouth masks, blood stains and grease stains. Regardless how big or how small.