For once it’s not Lady Gaga’s eccentrically bizarre costumes and get-ups which have bulldozed the world and caused colossal jaw-drops, but rather, well, the lack of.
The pop sensation bares all (and we mean all) in a new video for Serbian artist Marina Abramovic’s Kickstarter campaign to raise money for the Marina Abramovic Institute. The institute will be a centre in which participants can practise the Abramovic method, which Gaga can be seen performing during the video; a series of exercises intended to ‘heighten participants’ awareness of their physical and mental experience in the present moment.
Never going to be that mundane
Sounds like a strong coffee would do the trick, but with a partnership such as this, it was never going to be that mundane.
The video shows a remarkably toned and totally tattooed Gaga in various unusual positions around a picturesque forest (thankfully free of avid dog-walkers and countryside hikers), followed by shots of the singer in an empty wooden room cuddling up to a giant crystal. If you think it sounds strange, then you are completely right. It is nothing short of bizarre. And for a majority of the video, the ‘Fame’ queen is totally naked, putting rest to a particular rumour which may have recently circulated the globe.
Stick to the singing
Throughout the video, the unfortunate viewer can hear Gaga projecting the most unusual, guttural chanting sound. Abramovic describes the noise as a ‘very special sound from her throat. Four sounds [which] start from the rolling stomach and go through the heart,’ and explains that this method of somewhat ear-offending chanting is to ‘make the body hollow and release energy’, which all sounds a bit uncomfortable really.
I’d stick to the singing if I were you G.
Mother Monster endured a three-day retreat in upstate New York in order to practise and perfect the ‘Abramovic Method,’ during which she had no electricity, no means of contact with the outside world, a lake in which to wash and basic food which she had to consume slowly in order to form a connection.
Gaga has really gone gaga
This peak of pretentiousness slips easily past the barriers of strangeness-induced shock to the point of being pretty hilarious. Gaga really has gone gaga.
If you are familiar with Abramovic as an artist, the nature of this video would not have come as a shock to you. Her performance artwork is known for being somewhat peculiar and often outrageous. Throughout the 70’s, Abramovic worked with another performance artist, Ulay, on such works as ‘Relation in Space’, in which the two artists ran ceaselessly around a room in order to mix ‘male and female energy’ to create a third entity called ‘that self’, and ‘Relation in Movement’ in which the dubious duo drove their car inside a museum, completing 365 laps to represent each day of the year, while a black liquid oozed from the vehicle to form some sort of sculpture.
The idea for the latest horror blockbuster
I can’t imagine that the poor guy who had to clean up after that fiasco is a fan of Abramovic’s work. More recently, the artist is known for the 2010 performance ‘The Artist is Present,’ in which she sat static for 736 hours in the Museum of Modern Art, while members of the public sat opposite her and gazed upon the lady herself.
Just be thankful you weren’t in NYC’s Guggenheim Museum in November 2005, where the artist performed ‘Seven Easy Pieces,’ including Vito Acconci‘s 1972 performance in which the artist masturbated under the floorboards of a gallery as visitors walked overhead.
Now there’s an idea for the latest harrowing horror blockbuster.
With the help of Gaga’s celebrity endorsement, latest updates show that Marina’s Institute has received $228,683 of a $600,000 goal, which we have to admit, is quite impressive. If that’s all it takes to rack up that sort of cash, hand me my blindfold and giant crystal and I’ll be nakedly gallivanting around a forest in upstate New York in a heartbeat.
Kudos, ladies.
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