Marina Abramović on her Rhythm series – 'I was ready to go to the end'

Marina Abramović: All my inspiration was really about heroism and about stamina and about you know, pushing the risk of the human body

This was the whole thing why, probably, I am what I am

I really go to the end and then see what will happen

Maria Balshaw: Marina, we've come together to talk about your Rhythm series

We have been lucky enough to bring into the collection some of the extraordinary photographs that captured the work that you did in the mid 70s

And they give us an insight into those five extraordinary performances

One of the things that you have talked about a lot is how performance wasn't valued or the records weren't kept but these prints are the evidence and they are quite extraordinary objects in their own right. They're quite battered

Abramović: When I left Belgrade I escaped from my home

All what I did, I took these photographs under my arm and brought them in a second-class train to Amsterdam

They’re so full of scratches and of coffee spots

They’re broken on the side

My own life is kind of traced in these images

And that's really the beauty because then you understand also my nomadic life reflected in these images

Rhythm 10 was actually one of the first performances which I made in Edinburgh

Balshaw: Based, I understand it on a Slavic drinking game

Abramović: So it’s Russian/Slavic game where you know, late nights in the bars they will play this knife game

They will put knives between the fingers very fast

Balshaw: So like hand and then the knife stabbing between fingers

Abramović: I had 20 knives and then I have two tape recorders

Balshaw: An important part of the Rhythm performances are the quite precise instructions

Abramović: So the instructions were very much part of my entire childhood because my mother all my life was giving instructions to me

You know, she was like absolutely like a communist major in the army

So I will wake up and there will be instructions you know, what is in the fridge, what I should have for breakfast

And then when I start doing performances I always want to make instructions for myself which I follow religiously absolutely to the end and then they give me some kind of frame of action

I put a sheet of white paper on the floor

Number two, I put 20 of various sizes of knives on the paper

Number three, I switch on the tape recorder

Number four, I lacquer my left hand nails with the blue varnish

The action: I take a knife and stab in between the two fingers of my left hand

Every time I cut myself I take another knife

When I use all the knives, I change all the rhythms

I switch on the tape recorder with the recording sound of the action

Then I switch on another tape recorder

The second part of the action consists of repeating the game while listening to the sound, rhythm of the knives

Following the rhythm of the stabs I bring myself into such a state of concentration that I succeed to cut myself in the same time, simultaneously as the one before

I switch on the second tape recorder on which the rhythm of the stabs has been doubled

So this was Rhythm 10

Balshaw: You are in Edinburgh and Joseph Beuys is in the audience, watching you

So this is the formation of a whole shift in what we think art is

Because you are the art at this point and you are being watched by this other great shamanic figure from the 20th century

And between you, you were changing everything

Abramović: But that was such important, the trip to Edinburgh

It was the first time Joseph Beuys ever came out of Germany to do the performance that we met

He actually helped me in my career because he introduced my work to the other festivals of performance art of similar kind

So really it was important that meeting with him

Balshaw: And I find iso interesting that, of course you and Beuys and others were coming out of the gallery into the world to found spaces or festivals and so performance can't be contained by the walls of the gallery

Abramović: Seventies performance was not mainstream art in any possible way

There was always somehow or in the cellars or privately or some festivals that you’re part of it

But the rest didn't exist in the museums at all

It was absolutely not even seen as any kind of art

So Rhythm 5 was really difficult because you know, we live in communism that time with the five star symbols everywhere

On our schoolbooks, in every window, on the official building, so on

So I took this, you know, communist star and I created the outline with the wood

And I put the cover with hundred litres of gasoline

And I enter to this star

And I made the work with the star including lying in the middle

Balshaw: The thing that I found most shocking when I read about this, that you set it alight

So there is a very extreme amount of danger to the self there

So, what took you to that place where you wanted to put yourself at risk?

Abramović: I don’t even see the risk because I think just by entering to the state of consciousness in performance you actually enter to another state of mind

To me, performance was a holy ground

The only thing that actually happened that I didn't expect at all is that I lost consciousness because the oxygen was taken by the fire

And then there was a doctor in the audience, he see that burning the wood was falling on my feet and I didn't react

So they took me out and I was so angry

I was so angry

This was a performance was actually interrupted in the way with the limits of the body

Immediately after that I create two other performances where I use my body, conscious and not conscious, to see that I can push these limits and enter to that state

But all my inspiration was really about, you know, about heroism and about stamina and about, you know, pushing the risk of the human body

Balshaw: I think it's extraordinary that you were angry with your own body

Not angry or scared that you almost died

Abramović: But I was angry that actually this actually stopped performance because I want to lie in the middle till everything burn

And I see this trace of my body in this burning star

And this was a dream and it did not come

Balshaw: And you added your fingernails and cut your hair

For me there was something about the burning of witches

Abramović: This was a kind of combination of all of this, you know, from my grandmother’s background, very religious

My parents very communist

It was an interesting mix of everything

But actually I wanted to kind of sacrifice part of my body in the star

You know that Beuys came also to Belgrade and saw this performance of five point star, he was in audience

And before I start he said to me “Be very careful, fire is a dangerous thing”

And I just didn't listen, of course

Balshaw: Let's go back to that consciousness / unconsciousness

So which Rhythm was that?

Abramović: This was Rhythm 4

It was in Italy, in Milano

The performance is divided in two parts

One part was me and other part was the audience, they can only see me through the monitor

I had this very strong blower that you can blow with lots of air and I tried to inhale as much air as possible and it’s such a strong wave of the air that was moving my face, it looked like I’m under the water or some kind of... you didn’t understand because I never show the source of that wind

So it was always blowing

And in one point, I get so much more wind in my lungs that I actually lost consciousness, but the performance didn’t finish because public didn't know

But this was incredible for me victory that actually I can control my body with consciousness, without consciousness

Rhythm 2 was very different, it was in Zagreb in Museum of Modern Art and the curator who curated this piece almost lost his job

It was kind of a big deal

Balshaw: Because of the pills, the things that you did?

Abramović: Yes

Little table, little chair, transistor radio, a glass of water with the two pills

I took this first pill and I had almost seizure for 15 minutes with uncontrollable movement

Then I put the transistor on, on any radio station, just folk music or news or whatever, to give a little bit of time to prepare the second pill

And the second pill was what they give to very, very aggressive patients you know, to calm them down

So when I took the second pill I was six hours in front of the audience with a very stupid smile without knowing I was there

I was there but I was not there

Balshaw: Do you have any memory of that, those hours?

Abramović: No

This was... I was out

In the first part of the pill I could not control my physical movement and the second part of the, of this experience I could not control my mind

Balshaw: But if we move now to talk about if you like the culmination of the Rhythm performances, you turn your attention to the audience

So tell us about that Rhythm where you offer yourself as object to the audience

Abramović: But this is the last Rhythm

This is Rhythm 0

Directions: on the table there are various objects you can use on me

I am an object

The performance lasts for six hours, from 8 PM to 2 AM

I take all responsibility upon myself

So very clear

Simple

But this was hell

Balshaw: Rhythm 0 has been in Tate's collection for some time as a set of objects

But for those who haven't seen it, let's just...

The table is about this big

Abramović: Yeah

Balshaw: How many objects?

Abramović: 76

Balshaw: And some of them are pleasant and some of them are dangerous

Abramović: Yeah there were beautiful

The rose

They have a book

They have the hat, the feather

But then we have nails, chains

and needles

I mean, really heavy stuff

including the pistol and one bullet

You can do anything you want with me

I'm an object for six hours and I take all responsibility

Balshaw: I think that line is so significant

Important

I take all responsibility

Abramović: Yeah, because I put voluntarily myself in this current situation

You know, we’re talking about abuse or not abuse but if you put yourself voluntarily there

So, you know, whatever happens you are the responsibility

You know, the first part a person came and actually make a little circle around me with the, just the chalk on the floor, then they put my arms and they start putting feathers

You know, six hours is also important, take time to the people to develop courage to start doing it and then more and more and more

Then came the guy who cut my clothes with a scissor

Another one came with the rose

Another one came with the piece of the rose stuck into my body

Then they put the cotton around my neck and tried to burn and then put it away the fire

Then one was putting the drops of water on my head

There was the one that carried me, a group of people, on the table, open my legs, stuck the knife between

Then it was so many different things

Doing absolutely nothing is the beginning of everything

The most interesting thing was happening in Naples, in Italy, and they projected three basic kind of stereotypes of Italian culture on me

There was mother, Madonna and a whore and that was very interesting to see

But the moment I started moving, the audience ran away, they could not believe that become from being a statue, become real person

Balshaw: And did you feel in active danger?

Abramović: Yes I did, and this was a very, very scary performance

There was one special man, very... I never saw his face because he was very very small

He was always somewhere around my breast and he was constantly around me and all that I hear was heavy breathing

I never saw his face

And that was very scary

And then, you know, they put the bullet in the gun to see if I would go that far with my own hand to push the trigger which I really was ready because I, you know, you’re 23 and you want to die from art

I will not die for art now but this was a 23 years old

Balshaw: So you put a huge amount of trust in a group of strangers

Abramović: Yeah

But also not trust

I was ready to go to the end, that’s the difference, because I could really die there

That’s the thing, you know, when you enter the space of performance, I really go to the end and then see what will happen

Everybody was asking about pain but I used the body as a canvas

There was always interesting to me why the body have limits and how far we can go

Starting with rituals I really discovered the power of long durational work

It’s really brain transformation

You know like some of my performances are for months or two months or three months then it’s life itself

The only fear I have that I don't have enough time to do what I want to do and I just did one interview in The New York Times recently and I just say, I have no time to die

I just don’t have time

Please let me live a little longer

Balshaw: Well, you made a whole new field

Abramović: God, my life

My life is even too much for me