Masami Kubo
Figure 2.5: Who Sits Where, 2016
(Images from the live performance at Dixon Place)
Figure 2.5: Who Sits Where, 2016
(Images from the live performance at Dixon Place)
Set in a traditional blackbox theater, Masami Kubo continues to explore the relationship between chairs, spectatorship, and power in Figure 2.5: Who Sits Where, the third performance in her slideshow series. Figure 2.5: Who Sits Where is an extension of her previous performance Figure 2.0: A History of Two Chairs in that it investigates the relationship between technology, image culture, and belief systems. The slideshow depicts Kubo’s upbringing under the new religious movement Unificationism, in dialogue with pop culture, art history, and current events. The motif of chairs throughout Kubo’s slideshow bridges the sacred commodities within the Unification Church and various popular representations of chairs throughout time. By exploring a disjointed history of chairs, Kubo demystifies and re-contextualizes the complexes of belief, beginning with the Unification Church and broadening the conversation. Kubo’s presentations are designed and written based on the location and audience of the performance. Just as Figure 2.0 was critical of existing in an art space, so is Figure 2.5 reflective of the alternative spectatorship within traditional blackbox theaters.
Masami Kubo
Figure 2.5: Who Sits Where, 2016
(Images from the live performance at Dixon Place)
Figure 2.5: Who Sits Where, 2016
(Images from the live performance at Dixon Place)
