On 11 November 2016 at 7pm, Kunstverein München will present Darius Mikšys’ Dance With The Flag – a performance within the computer game Halo, presented in the Kino.
Performance art commonly has a set of integral conditions: a performer, an audience, an action, a time, a duration, and a location. In that sense, Darius Mikšys’ Dance With The Flag is no different. Yet it is very different, as Mikšys situates his demonstration in a grassy valley in the midst of the computer game, Halo. A military-science-fiction-first-person-shooter series, Halo centers on an interstellar war between humanity and a theocratic alliance of aliens known as the Covenant. It’s played by a global community who, equipped with an impossible amount of weaponry, engage in violent or objective-based simulated combat. Mikšys’ proposal is to briefly suspend the cycle of simulated violence and to use this unique terrain as a stage for a special dance performance and workshop.
On 11 November 2016, Mikšys will convene a group of participants from around the world to view his performance in situ. After briefly exploring this simulated world, these 15 players will gather at a pre-determined and password-protected location to await the arrival of Mikšys’ avatar. One of the multiplayer activities in Halo is a game of ‘Capture The Flag’, where teams compete to bring a flag to a predetermined area, and the player holding the flag is unable to fire weapons. Playing from the Center for Contemporary Art in Glasgow where he is on residency, Mikšys will appear, take hold of this flag, and then enact a series of movements for the audience. One of these players will serve as a cameraman, whose choreographed first-person perspective will be projected in the Kino so that viewers can bear witness to Mikšys’ performance. Following Mikšys’ demonstration, the artist avatar will then teach his dance routine to the assemblage of spectators – introducing a new movement to the game in hopes of inspiring other dancers. By presenting an uncommon activity within this specific software system, Mikšys accentuates the world of Halo as a site of possibility and new forms of publicness.
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Darius Mikšys, Halo Dress (2016), photographed at Sauchiehall St., Glasgow.
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Darius Mikšys, Dance With The Flag, Image from Performance. Courtesy of the artist.