YES!NO!YES!NO! - FREE TO EMBRACE

Rituals are the foundation of our everyday lives; they influence social choreography. They are woven into the fabric of our lives and create a space of trust. Rituals include hugs, glances and handshakes. We understand rituals to mean both situational interactions and complex social scenarios. Our bodies serve as a medium; they help us to convey information and receive signals from other people. The performance ignites the operationalisation of ‘yes’ and ‘no’, in which Olivia Wiederkehr can reveal her preoccupation with active vigilance within the social space. To this end, she has compiled her thoughts into short statements that can be understood as an invitation to an open dialogue about personal freedom of action. These statements are activated on costumes made especially for the Biennale and worn by the performers as they walk through the city: the artist thus creates an invitation in public space to engage in spontaneous dialogue with passers-by about freedom, closeness and distance. Questions such as: How social is ‘social distance’? How has the pandemic reduced or expanded the personal space of each of us? are thus negotiated in the transience of public space, with the knowledge that the unknown counterpart is free to decide whether to accept or reject this invitation to dialogue.

Performing Social Rituals was a performance programme within the Ural Industrial Biennale 2021, developed with the support of the Pro Helvetia Moscow Foundation.