TEXT    OF    THE    PERFORMANCE    

performed by Martin Guillaud

 

" You are about to witness the extraction of the artwork. This marks the precise moment when the cellulose skin is removed from its microbial cultivation bath after three months of incubation.

 

At this point, the connection to its culture will be irreversibly severed, the microbial structures in the vat will be disturbed, and the symbiotic process will be interrupted.

 

This moment, as fleeting as it is, has yet to occur and will soon be over.

 

Meanwhile, the symbiotic ecosystem in the vat will continue its cycle, forming a new layer of cellulose. The extracted cellulose piece will then begin its drying process, losing 95% of its water weight over the course of two weeks at controlled humidity levels. During this time, it will shrink from 40 kilos to just 200 grams. Only the traces of its past vital activity will remain on the dehydrated cellulose.

 

During both the extraction and dehydration phases, the artwork is extremely vulnerable—susceptible to colonization by external microorganisms, disintegration, distortion, and division.

 

Since the beginning of this introduction, the artwork has already undergone several metamorphoses, guided by ongoing cellular duplications.

 

If the response of the microorganisms to various interventions—with fabrics, natural pigments, and other manipulations—has been recorded only in approximate terms by the recreational human, the microorganisms’ reaction to his everwatchful eye is even more uncertain.

 

In report n°112, the recreational human notes: “As a matter of definition, all measurement entails an exchange of information.”

 

They add: “Observing the artwork during its three months of growth has been like watching the movements of the sky, as if I could touch and smell this transience.”