The Abramovic Stare: COULD YOU HANDLE IT?
  • The Abramovic Stare: COULD YOU HANDLE IT?
The Marina Abramovic exhibition this spring at MoMA in New York was huge.

Thousands of people waiting in line just to sit across from the Serbian-born artist, stare at her, and have, you know, feelings and experiences. Christiane Amanpour and Lou Reed, Abramovic was looking at you!

And a cast of re-performers was hired to stage highlights from Abramovic's past works, including, most famously, the performance in which Abramovic and Ulay stood naked in an Italian gallery doorway people had to pass through in order to see the rest of the art.

People called the whole thing alternately wondrous, life-changing, problematic, and narcissistic. But nobody ignored it—and it caused lots of minds to wonder about the continuing future, and continuing past, of performance art in museums.

How was it being one of those re-performers? When did MoMA exercise too much protectiveness, and actually change the nature of the work? What was the interview to get the job like?

Heather Kravas, a performer who lives part of the year in Seattle, tells about it in this week's online-only version of the paper, here.