Grad Art Faculty Member Seeks Bodies to be Part of Performance Art Event This Sunday

Grad Art core faculty Lita Albuquerque is creating a large scale performance for the Pacific Standard Time Public Art and Performance Festival and is looking for students, faculty and alumni from the Art Center community to sign up to participate this coming Sunday, January 22nd at noon at the Baldwin Hills Scenic Outlook in Culver City.

Spine of the Earth, Lita Albuquerque, 1980. Ephemeral installation at El Mirage Dry Lake Bed, CA. Lita Albuquerque © Lita Albuquerque Studio, 1980.

As described on the Pacific Standard Time website, Spine of the Earth 2012 is taking place this Sunday and is a recreation of Albuquerque’s 1980 Spine of the Earth, where the artist created a land based work at the bed of the El Mirage Dry Lake. The piece created a giant “geometric pattern over six-hundred feet in diameter” and turned the Earth into a artist’s canvas. In Albuquerque’s recreation twenty two years later, she won’t be painting the earth but will be making a “performative sculpture” that requires at least five hundred people.

As part of the open call to artists, designers and the general public, Albuquerque is looking for students, faculty and alumni from the Art Center community to participate in the performance. Sign up is easy at spineoftheearth2012.com. According to the site, participants will be involved in a very simple walking based movement (choreographed by LA-based choreographers WIFE) and will receive a signed, limited-edition artifact of the performance.

Kyle Fitzpatrick, who blogged about the upcoming event, wrote that he received the following details after signing up to participate:

• The event is this Sunday between 12PM and 2PM. If you are participating, you need to be on site no later than 8AM.

• This actually will not be in the desert (phew), but in Baldwin Hills Scene Overlook in Culver City, between Jefferson and La Cienega.

• All participants will be involved in a very simple walking-based movement that will take place outdoors

• What will you be wearing? A red jump suit! You should wear dark clothing and “comfortable walking shoes” in neutral colors to go underneath, though. You’ll also be keeping your red jumpsuit, which Lita will be signing as a thank you for participating.

• Don’t bring your kids: all participants must be 16 and over.

• Bring food money, as they will have food trucks there for eating. You’ll also be getting free coconut water!

The piece is a part of Pacific Standard Time’s Performance and Public Art Festival, which begins Thursday, January 19, continuing through Saturday, January 29. Pacific Standard Time: Art in L.A. 1945-80 is a collaboration of cultural institutions across Southern California coming together to celebrate the birth of the L.A. art scene.