Recall: Evening of Performances (2008–2019)

October 2021–December 2022

Recall: Evening of Performances (2008–2019) is a series of interviews, podcasts and contributions from some of the artists who participated in the twelve editions of our celebrated Evening of Performances.

For well over a decade, we have been championing performance across its many forms — from intimate spoken word to absurdist interventions, DJing, dance, music, theatre, fashion and much more.

For this year-long programme, we turned to the artists and performers we have closely collaborated with in the past, to celebrate, listen and learn from their perspectives and explore what the next wave of contemporary performance can become with the artists who have shaped it so far.

Explore the interviews, Q&A's and podcasts below.

On Collections Podcast with Dora García
Evening of Performances 2008

In 2008, Dora García performed The Game of Questions, a performance that blurred boundaries between spectator and performer.

We invited Dora García, whose work features in the David and Indrė Roberts Collection, to choose a work from the collection as the starting point for a conversation. She chose Ida Applebroog’s A Performance, (1977-1981), which sparks a discussion about reading and performance, marginality and collaboration.

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Q&A with Reto Pulfer
Evening of Performances 2009

‘Without any announcement I started clapping as if I were to applaud. That made people quiet and they started staring at me. [. . .] tensions rose.’

Reto Pulfer performed Applause in 2009 without having announced to anyone what his plan was. In our Q&A, he talks to us about playing with liveness and the attention of the audience, listening to objects and his current interest in botany.

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Q&A with Laure Prouvost
Evening of Performances 2010 & 2017

‘I now mostly hand over performances to objects, films, octopuses – they perform instead of me to pass on messages.’

As one of the few artists we have commissioned more than once for Evening of Performances, Laure Prouvost is well-placed to reflect on changes in contemporary performance and how that has impacted her practice.

In 2010, Laure Prouvost presented From The Sky, a performance in which she narrated an event that occurred a few weeks earlier, but the narration seemingly falls short with no fixed conclusion.

Returning seven years later to KOKO Camden, Prouvost presented a new musical performance called Exhausted...excited exhaustion with Trim, that combined melodic composition and dialogue in front of a vast backdrop film.

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Q&A with Leah Capaldi
Evening of Performances 2011

‘At art school I performed all my work, I thought I needed to do this for it to be authentic. Re-thinking authorship in relation to performance helped me take a step back.'

In 2011, Capaldi presented Give, where participants held positions in response to Miriam Cahn’s paintings from the David and Indrė Roberts Collection. In our Q&A, she speaks to us about collaboration, authorship and collecting performance.

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Interview with Eddie Peake
Evening of Performances 2012

At Evening of Performances in 2012, Eddie Peake presented Creating And Collapsing a Drama or How It Must Feel To Be An Ill Dog Wearing One Of Those Plastic Head Funnels, a performance which involved a flautist, three professional dancers and three camera operators.

In our interview, Eddie reflects on the performance and how it has since influenced his approach to documentation. We discussed his early experiences of creating performance and how it has impacted how he views art.

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Q&A with Florence Peake
Evening of Performances 2013

‘I remember the atmosphere only, because it is so distinctly different from what crowded spaces feel like now. Hot, stuffy, close […]’

Florence Peake’s Swell the thickening surface was a new movement work comprising of two duets and a solo presented at Evening of Performances in 2013. In our Q&A, she reflects on how different it would be to perform amongst big audiences nowadays, how sensations become movements and why she spoke to a shaman before performing.

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Q&A with Goshka Macuga
Evening of Performances 2016

‘We need rituals in our lives, and making or seeing art can be considered as such. The dilemma is how to participate in such an exchange during this time'

In our Q&A, Goshka Macuga looks back on End of Line, her work for Evening of Performances 2016 and considers what has changed in performance over the years and discusses the value of working with a wide range of collaborators, from scientists to dancers.

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Interview with Mark Wallinger
Evening of Performances 2016

We caught up with Mark Wallinger, asking him about the journey of his performance practice, including working with an actor to deliver his diaristic writing on Bruce Nauman in MAKE ME THINK ME for Evening of Performances 2016 and what it was like to perform in that bear costume: ‘Outside it was about minus seven, but inside the bear costume it was equatorial.’

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On Togetherness Podcast with Nkisi
Evening of Performances 2017

Nkisi was commissioned to perform a DJ set as part of our Evening of Performances at KOKO Camden in 2017.

In this special edition of our On Togetherness podcast, she is joined by artist and choreographer Tiran Willemse to discuss how they work together and jointly explore the relationships between performance, audience and environment with reference to their recent collaborative project, (bb).

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Interview with Stacy Makishi
Evening of Performances 2018

In our interview, Stacy spoke to us at length about the things that shape her performances, from Mary Poppins to comedy, fear and pinch pots. We also took time to look back at her performance Stacy Makishi and the Proud Marys at Evening of Performances 2018, including the unexpected moment; ‘I accidentally thrust my radio-mic-pack out of my underpants... it was dangling like a tampon between my legs.'

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On Togetherness Podcast with Grace Schwindt
Evening of Performances 2018

As part of Evening of Performances 2018, Grace presented The Boxer. This performance proposed that the intimate moment of sharing physical and mental wounds could be a way to create open relations.

In this special edition of our On Together podcast, Belgian curator and academic Katleen Van Langendonck joins Grace Schwindt to discuss Grace’s practice and the crossovers between Katleen’s current research into performance and how it translates across visual arts and theatre.

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Recall: Evening of Performances (2008–2019)

Recall: Evening of Performances (2008–2019)
Interview with Stacy Makishi

On Collections: Dora García on Ida Applebroog

On Togetherness: Nkisi and Tiran Willemse

Recall: Evening of Performances (2008–2019)
Q&A with Leah Capaldi

Recall: Evening of Performances (2008–2019)

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