Performance 5:
Mark Leckey
October 1, 2, and 3, 2009, 8:00 p.m.
ABRONS ARTS CENTER
at the Henry Street Settlement
466 Grand Street
New York, NY
MoMA CONTINUES PERFORMANCE EXHIBITION SERIES WITH A LIVE PERFORMANCE-BASED WORK BY MARK LECKEY
The Museum of Modern Art presents the North American premiere of Mark Leckey in the Long Tail (2009), a performance-based work presented in a theater for performing arts at the Abrons Arts Center on October 1, 2, and 3, 2009, at 8:00 p.m. Throughout the performance—which is part lecture, part monologue, and part living sculpture—Leckey engages the topics of television and broadcasting history, from the BBC to the icon of Felix the Cat, while simultaneously addressing the “Long Tail” theory of internet-based economics.
Mark Leckey in the Long Tail is a multimedia lecture delivered by the artist in an installation resembling the soundstage of a movie. Incorporating a series of props, the performance involves a live reconstruction of the first television broadcast. In his lecture, Leckey demonstrates how a doll of Felix the Cat became the first image of the twentieth century transmitted into public consciousness and how, for Leckey, the figure becomes the embodiment of the Long Tail phenomenon of the twenty-first century. Throughout the performance Leckey animates his conversational meanderings with special effects in an attempt to conjure up the emerging nature of the Long Tail and how the Internet is changing the nature of demand, exchange, and, by extension, profit and creativity.
Winner of the 2008 Turner Prize, Leckey (British, b. 1964) is currently Professor of Film Studies, Städelschule, Frankfurt am Main, Germany. Leckey’s work has been exhibited at P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, New York; Tate Britain, London; and at the Istanbul Biennial, Turkey. His work is included in collections at Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; and the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis. Two of Leckey’s works are in MoMA’s collection: Made in ‘Eaven (2004) and Cinema in the Round (2006–08), which was recently acquired by the Museum.
Tickets to the performance are available for purchase via the Abrons Arts Center website at www.abronsartscenter.org or by phone at (212) 352-3101. The Abrons Arts Center box office opens 30 minutes before curtain.
The Performance Exhibition Series is organized by Klaus Biesenbach, Chief Curator, and Jenny Schlenzka, Assistant Curator for Performance, Department of Media and Performance Art.
The Performance Exhibition Series and the Performance Workshop are made possible by the Wallis Annenberg Fund for Innovation in Contemporary Art.
For press information, please contact Paul Jackson at (212) 708-9593 or paul_jackson@moma.org.
THE MUSEUM OF MODERN ART
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