Context:

This work developed out of a residency in the Sheree Rose and Bob Flanagan Collection at the ONE National Gay and Lesbian Archives in Los Angeles. The performance was made in collaboration with Rose and emerged out of hole in the archive. Rose and Flanagan conceived of a death trilogy in 1994, as Flanagan was dying from CF. He died before parts two and three could be made. This piece is a realising of, a version, of the third part of the trilogy, with the original title. In this work, I appear as a zombie version of Flanagan.  It is a 24 hour performance, watched by spectators through multi-screen CCTV footage in a different space to the performers. The video documentation included in this submission is the CCTV footage.

 

Imperatives: 

• To explore performance as a way to activate archival material about sickness and dying. 
• To explore the ways in which autopathography might be generated from the archives of other artists. 

 

Critical Reflections and Dissemination: 

• O’Brien, Martin and David MacDiarmid (eds). (2018) Survival of the Sickest: The Art of Martin O'Brien, London: Live Art Development Agency. 
• O’Brien, Martin. ‘Sheree, Bob and Me: Performing Painful Histories’ in Rated RX: Sheree Rose With and After Bob Flanagan. Ed. Yetta Howard, (Ohio: Ohio State University Press) 

 

Research Findings:

• Durational performance enables an exploration of temporalities of chronic illness in ways that undermine common representations of the patient.
• Archives can be generative sites for making performance about sickness and dying through reactivating historical work.