by Kate Antosik Parsons

Frances Mezzetti, Between and Beyond, Out of Site, Clontarf Promenade, November 2008.

A description of the performance from Open Spaces brochure published by Dublin City Council reads:

Frances Mezzetti – Between and Beyond. 2.30-3.30pm
Nestled in the trees along the beginning of the walkway the artist will create a portrait based on her interactions with the local nursing home.[1]

I was there that cold, rainy day on the 8th November 2008, where I witnessed several performances from Out of Site, the public outdoor exhibition of performance art curated by Michelle Browne. Out of Site included works by Amanda Coogan, Pauline Cummins, Gareth Kennedy, Alastair MacLennan and Dominic Thorpe, and others sited at different locations along the Clontarf Promenade and the walkway end of Bull Island. Intending to spend the day with the performances, I went first to the Bull Island performances before heading down the promenade, thus inadvertently missing some of the performances sited in the opposite direction. I was surprised when I later learned that one those performances, Frances Mezzetti’s Between and Beyond, was concerned with Rose Parsons (1930-2010), my partner’s elderly great-aunt who at that time was resident in the Clontarf Private Nursing Home.

When I recently met with Mezzetti to discuss her art practice she gave me a bundle of materials relating to Between and Beyond. Included were preliminary sketches of Rose in her 30s and as an ageing woman in her twilight years, a family tree that aimed at understanding Rose’s place within a large family, and detailed notes relating the different journeys Rose made around Ireland and abroad. As part of the research process Mezzetti also recorded an oral history with Rose. From the material traces I learned that Rose had a sense of adventure, and as a member of the Legion of Mary in the 1960s, she travelled to Venezuela where she lived for three years. Mezzetti told me that the local people Rose met were puzzled that she did not have a child. When she explained she was unmarried, they told her that was not important in their culture and that even the local priest had children. I tried to imagine Rose’s shock upon hearing this.

Mezzetti unfolded a large white translucent piece of fabric hemmed at both ends for me to view. I was reminded of a voile curtain panel, the kind often used to let light into a sitting room while still maintaining privacy. It bore a larger than life bust portrait drawn with a felt-tipped black marker of young Rose wearing a cross necklace, indicating the special place that spirituality held in her life. Grasping it in both hands, I held it high, gazing into the eyes of someone unknown to me but so incredibly familiar.

Mezzetti explained this fabric was suspended top and bottom by wire strung between two trees. She described the difficulty of constructing this hanging portrait, and the necessity of pressing the fabric up against a hard surface to provide the resistance enabling her to draw on it. I ran my hands over its surface, visualising the challenges this fabric posed for mark marking and imagined how Mezzetti’s hands touched where I touched. Evading my grasp, its silky texture slipped from between my fingers. Perhaps this material alluded to the elusiveness of memories, so real and yet distant. Mezzetti pointed to Rose’s hair where a faint trace of a word was still visible. In the course of the performance, she inscribed parts of Rose’s biography onto the fabric, and in turn, these composed the cohesive image.

At home I performed gestures of my own as I held Mezzetti’s two sketches of Rose in my hands. I swivelled my head between them, old/young, old/young, repeating the action several times looking at each feature: eyebrows, eyes, nose, mouth, chin. I did so in the hopes that these encounters with the documentation might enable me to identify shared resemblances between Mezzetti’s portraits of Rose and my children, one of whom nearly shares her birthday and exact name. Though I wasn’t in attendance at the live performance, I attempt to construct an understanding of it based on Mezzetti’s descriptions and the material traces of the performance I encountered, coupled with my recollection of the cold air on the seafront that day. Remarkably, Rose, at 79 years of age, was present that day to observe the performance. What was she thinking as she stood there on that windswept promenade watching an image of her youthful face unfold in front of her? Did it harken back to that exciting time when her travels took her overseas to faraway places? Did people watching the performance recognise the past and present faces of Rose?

When I showed some family members Mezzetti’s sketches and explain that Rose was present at the performance, they were fascinated. One recalled Rose returning from Venezuela and speaking only Spanish. Another remarked that Rose was a reserved person and marveled at the artist’s skill in establishing a trust with Rose. Recalling Mezzetti’s previous work as a nurse and midwife, I consider how her deep listening techniques and quiet confidence enable her to make meaningful connections with people. Examining the documentation and contemplating the performance eleven years after it took place, Between and Beyond raises several points of interest. I think of knowing about someone but not knowing them. I consider ideas about the meaning of individual memories in the context of wider familial histories and how performance art facilitates engagement with these histories. Though Rose’s life history does not belong to me or Mezzetti, the history attached to this specific performance finds new life in the present through our mutual engagement with it. When entrusting me with the performance documentation, Mezzetti extended her performance, enabling it to move between and beyond different layers of histories and their absences. In turn, this remembering and retelling of the performance suggested ways in which it is possible to enact new relationships to past performances.

[1]http://www.dublincity.ie/sites/default/files/content/RecreationandCulture/ArtsOffice/Programmes/Documents/OpenSpaces_Programme.pdf

by Emma Brennan

This year saw the thirteenth edition of the prolific FIX festival. Established by Catalyst Arts in 1994, for twenty-five years, FIX has consistently delivered an innovative programme of local and international live, sonic and performance artists to the city of Belfast. It is internationally renowned as one of Europe’s longest running live art festivals. Book-ended between Culture Night and October’s late Night Art, this year saw more than 20 artists participate over the two weeks in multiple venues across the city. Much like it’s parent, Catalyst Arts, FIX boasts an undeniable reputation for showing iconic, thought provoking work and is a vital outlet for contemporary art practices in Northern Ireland.

The legacy of this festival is tightly sewn into the cultural fabric of the city of Belfast, and hence was one of the biggest draws for me to pursue a Directorship at Catalyst Arts. Needless to say, the opportunity to then project manage such a beast was both an exciting and intimidating prospect. The very definition of being a festival posed an endless index of possibilities for what FIX19 could become and an equally long list of anxieties for me as an emerging curator.

In our initial conversation about performing at this year’s FIX19, BBeyond member and no stranger to the festival itself, Brian Patterson, offered me a formula for approaching live art events which helped ease this anxiety. An equation of sorts that I frequently meditated on in the overwhelming moments of the festival, helping to keep my head above water.

The gospel according to Brian:

First there is the individual: The you, I, singular, artist, curator, maker…etc

Then there is the group: The collaboration or collective, an organisation…etc

Finally there is the broader: The abstract, a concept or a movement, the social, political, or ideological…etc

These three elements arose throughout the festival in all the individuals involved, organisations like Catalyst and BBeyond, featured themes of Transnationalism and works that varied in content and concept. The performances at this years FIX19 were equally sensitive to their individual avenues of thought and challenged everything from horticulture to institutional abuse. From French artist’s Ouazzani & Carrier exploration of Belfast through the foraging, producing and hosting of their tea infusions to Dominic Thorpe’s harrowing durational performance, during which he self-suffocated with the application of layers upon layers of petroleum jelly, FIX19 proved Patterson’s theorem throughout.

Brian’s live art hack also reminded me throughout the festival that the overall outcome was not solely my responsibility or achievement. FIX was bigger than me or Catalyst and any other singular element. In actuality, the undeniable success of FIX came from all of these factors working together towards a common goal.

Artists, levelling from emerging to established, travelled from all over the world to not only perform at FIX but also to help one another install work, support each other, act as viewers and bestow their great knowledge as facilitators. The beautiful and rewarding moments of the whole experience came from watching these strangers join together to share spaces, conversations, food, pints, laughter, infusions and much more.

My very own introduction to performance art, Dominic Thorpe, not only did me the great honour of accepting an invitation to perform at FIX19 but also spent the evening before his own performance standing in the lashings of rain to support Bbeyond’s work; carrying things, encouraging others and at one point even holding an umbrella above me so I could document their work. The kind acts of this gentle man are just one example of the considerate and generous work that was happening outside of the contracted work that define FIX19 for me.

‘’Consider stillness as empty time, into which a performance can be poured’’ – Anthony Howell

The beginnings of the festival felt a lot like this, a stillness. An eerie calm before the chaos reigned. A run of blank days over a two week period into which an array of things had to be poured. In the months leading up to and during  FIX19 an abundance of hard work, consideration, patience and what can only be identified as love were committedly donated by each participating artist, fellow project manager Anne Mager, myself, the Catalyst Board, volunteers, viewers and everyone in between.

To sum it up in its entirety would be a futile attempt and not one I will make for your sake and for mine. Not alone because of the sheer volume of the festival but also because of the very essence of performance art and the liveness of it. However I can say that standing now, on the other side of it, I feel I have received a great gift in my experience with it all. For this I have to give my sincerest gratitude to the entire FIX family, for your kind generosity and unwavering compassion throughout the festival. Upon reflection I am met with beautiful, emotional memories that will help define my time at Catalyst Arts and I hope you have all been equally rewarded in your experience with us.

FIX19 took place between September 20th and October 3rd 2019.

Participating artists were (in order of appearance): Brennagh Meehan, Lee Hamill, Aoife O’Connor, Evamaria Schaller, BBeyond, Ouazzani & Carrier, Dominic Thorpe, Bettina Wenzel, Amanda Coogan, Rory Mullen.

Member’s Screening Artists: Andrea Piras Pinna, Áine Phillips, C J Woods, Eleni Kolliopoulou, John D’Arcy, Kate McElroy, Katharine May, Marianne Dupain, Nenad Bogdanovic, Nollaig Molloy, Rachel Macmanus, Sally O’Dowd, Sarah Lundy, Tadhg Ó Cuirrín, Uri Kloss, Valerie Driscoll, Vasiliki Stasinaki.

Curators: Emma Brennan, Anne Mager

Catalyst Board at the time: Emma Brennan, Leah Corbett, Edy Fung, Peter Glasgow, Anne Mager, Liam McCartan, Thomas Wells.

Photographer: Jordan Hutchings

For information on the festival: www.catalystarts.org.uk/projects#/fix19