On February 9, 2022, UPAA was founded in Chengdu, China.
In the following section, we will explain in some detail the origins of the Archives, the founding process, its nature and positioning, its future plans, as well as its organizational structure, fund-raising methods, and other topics through interviews with the founders of the Archives in order to provide a more comprehensive understanding of how the Archives operates and what its values are.
Q: When was it? What was the reason? What made you want to do UP-ON Upward Performance Art Archive?
A: The idea was born from two things. One is that in 2015, during my participation in art events in Europe, I visited Black Kit Performance Art Archive (Black Box), a performance art archive founded by Boris Nieslony Boris Nieslony in 1981, in Cologne, Germany. I was inspired by Boris’s two-hour-plus narrative. The other thing is that in 2017, I saw some materials from the Polish performance art underground in the 1970s and 1980s at an art institution in Poland. Those blurred images and coarse texts exuded shocking power. Thinking of the scattered, gradually neglected and forgotten documents during the development of Chinese performance art in the past 50 years (counting from Xie Deqing’s “Jumping” in Taiwan in 1973), as well as the fact that they have always been demonized and lack of academic research on them, I had the idea of founding a similar institution to preserve, display and research performance art documents.
Zhou Bin visits Black Kit Performance Art Archive, a performance art archive founded by Boris Nieslony Boris Nieslony in 1981, 2015, Cologne, Germany
Q: What impresses you most about the Black Kit Archive in Germany?
A: The collection of the archive is very rich in variety, including pictures, videos, texts, albums and other documentary materials of different periods of performance art from all over the world, as well as objects produced by the artists in the course of their creations. One of the most shocking things to me was when Boris pointed to an aluminum box on the shelf that was about 40 centimeters high and asked me: Do you know what this is? As he said, he took it out and put it on the table, opened it and saw that it was stuffed with stuffed toys, took out some of the toys, and leaked out an ochre-colored ceramic jar, Boris opened the lid and said: This is the ashes of Norbert Klassen, a Swiss artist, who had decided to donate his ashes to the Documenta Bank after his death. I had met the artist before at an art event in Thailand, when he was in his 60s, tall, with a red pentagram tattooed on his head.
Ashes of Swiss artist Norbert Klassen preserved in the Black Kit Performance Art Archive
Q: What led Boris Nielslony to start the Black Kit Archive in 1981?
A: Boris is an artist who has been working in the field of performance art since the end of the 70’s. He founded the important performance art group Black Market International, and in 1979 he started to curate the Künstlerhaus art space in Hamburg. 1981 he initiated the first KONZIL at the Kunsthalle in Stuttgart, in which 40-80 artists were invited to take part. During the month-long creative exchange, the discussion focused on the question “How to work and live together in the arts?” A large number of documents were produced during KONZIL, which Boris realized were valuable and archived in a black cabinet. A black cabinet was created and the Black Kit Performance Art Archive was born. In October 2021, Black Kit’s 40th anniversary was commemorated with the launch of a 1-month experimental campaign to demonstrate that the archive, which emerged from practice, continues to be and remains a site of practice.
Q: How is the Black Kit archive funded and how does it operate?
A: Funding comes primarily from foundation support. Some years ago Boris donated the archive to the Universität zu Köln, but then he decided that the University of Cologne hadn’t done a very good job of making the documentation work and took it back. In the past two years the archive has received special funding from the foundation to digitize the documentation, which is a huge amount of work.
Foto: Konzil, Stuttgart 1981 © KONZIL & International Performance Art Archive BLACK KIT | DIE SCHWARZE LADE
Q: The idea of starting an archive came to you in 2015, why did you start doing it in 2021?
A: When I returned to China that year, I started to seek for a partner who could finance the archive’s office space, but the opportunity was not there, and it was unsuccessful for six years. During the 9th UP-ON Up International Live Art Festival in October last year, we invited some critics, curators and managers of art organizations to gather at the Guanghui Art Museum to exchange and discuss the establishment of a performance art archive. We all recognized the significance and value of this project, and in November 2021, I refurbished a private house as office space and officially launched the UP-ON Performance art Archive project.
Q: How do you consider the positioning of the archive?
A: The Archive is a non-profit organization focusing on the research and promotion of performance art. The direction of its work is to collect and preserve performance art materials and literature from an international perspective, and to organize, display and research them in a targeted manner. It also builds a professional communication and practice platform by organizing lectures, forums, workshops, festivals, publications and other forms of activities. At the same time, we invite experts and scholars to conduct thematic research and discussion on the possibilities of the future development of performance art. We emphasize that the archive is definitely not a static storage space for documents, but an engine and incubator, a platform to promote the current practice of performance art and to explore the future direction.
UP-ON Up Performance Art Archive First Working Consultation Tea Party January 18, 2022, Chengdu
Q: Why is performance art not live art?
A: Live art encompasses a wide range of media forms such as performance, sound, theater, and dance, and is too broad. The Archives focuses its attention on performance art, one reason being that performance art is sufficiently magical to encounter in real-life environments, and the other reason being that performance art as an artistic medium has a sufficiently broad field worthy of study and exploration.
Q: What are the plans for the archive after its inception?
A: In the starting year of the archive, the focus is to allow sufficient time for the software and hardware to grind to a good state, and the load should not be too heavy. The collection and organization of documentation is the regularized basic work, in addition to this, in 2022 the archive has identified six work sections:
- Art Festival: the tenth UP-ON up International Live Art Festival. The art festival has been held nine times. It is held regularly in October every year, inviting domestic and international artists to Chengdu to create live works, host workshops and lectures.
- Lectures: four special lectures. Experts and scholars with achievements in performance art creation and practice, theoretical research and activity organization are invited to share their experiences through lectures and discuss the future possibilities of the industry in depth.
- Workshops: two master classes. Experienced and profound attainments instructors are invited to organize one-week workshops and training camps, and participants are limited to young artists with certain creative experience. The discussion and practice of performance art education is an important part of the archive’s own knowledge production. Educational platforms run by artists outside the system often open up a wider range of possibilities in terms of teaching methods and content.
- Sharing Sessions: a program organized from time to time. Discussions and dialogues are organized on noteworthy phenomena and topics.
- Publication: A yearbook (tentatively titled “In Focus”). The content includes a summary of the archive’s work for the year. It will report on important information in the field of performance art at home and abroad, and analyze and comment on important works and theories. We have high expectations for Focus (tentative name), and we want to make it a benchmark text in the field of performance art with academics, attitudes and positions.
- Research: The Archives encourages the use of the collection for thematic research and academic results by accepting applications and directional invitations from researchers.
More work projects planned by the Archives will be gradually implemented in the future, such as the filming plan for the type of thematic research, the research and writing of the history of regional performance art, and so on. One step at a time.
Q: That’s a lot of work! Please introduce the work team.
A: The Archives has a team of four people, including the founder. There are also professionals who collaborate on projects and numerous volunteers. The archive is a non-profit organization, and in principle the work is voluntary. The daily work team receives a symbolic subsidy on the premise of guaranteeing the funding of the archive’s operation. We do not rule out the possibility of offering a reasonable remuneration package in the future, which would also guarantee the healthy functioning of the archive. But for the time being, it is still a matter of sentiment.
Q: What documents are currently in the Archives’ collections?
A: The Archives’ current main collection consists of four sections:
UP-ON International Live Art Festival Collection As of the 9th Festival in 2021, a total of 88 international artists and 159 Chinese artists have created live works at the Festival. Images, videos, derivatives of works, interviews, and other documentation of the works of these 247 artists constitute the main collection of the archive at present.
Performance Art in Chengdu Since its emergence in the 1990s, performance art in Chengdu has continued to be active, forming an ecosystem of artists, critics, art organizations, media, sponsors, institutions, and the public that is unparalleled in China. In this process, a rich variety of performance art materials have been produced, including pictures, videos, audio recordings, media reports, books and magazines.
Performance Art Materials in Chinese University Education The good performance art ecology in the Chengdu region has also allowed for good interaction between performance art and university education, from lectures and live events at institutions such as Chuan Yin Academy of Fine Arts at the beginning of the 21st century, to live creations, lectures, and workshops organized by UP-ON Upward Bound Art Festival at universities every session after 2008, and then to Sichuan Fine Arts Academy’s first precedent in China’s art institutions in 2012 The opening of a performance art class (which was discontinued in 2017), and so on, are all historically important events. The archive has a more complete collection of information files, such as pictures, videos, media reports, and review articles.
Other domestic and international Performance art literature This part of the information is mostly collected from professional exchange activities at home and abroad.
Visitors to the UPON Performance Art Archive, Chengdu, February 2022
Q: What are the future ways for the Archives to obtain documentation?
A: The Archives will adopt an international perspective in acquiring materials from different sources. Part of the collection will be donated or purchased by museums, art galleries, bookstores and people from all walks of life. Observers from different cities with whom the Archive cooperates will collect documents locally and mail them to Chengdu for cataloging. The Archives also tries to visit the sites of art events to make on-site recordings and add them to the collection.
Q: That’s a lot of ambition!
A: It’s okay. In fact, the fact that the archive has a wealth of documentation is only the foundation, the archive is more of an engine and incubator, a platform to promote the current discussion and practice of performance art and to explore the future direction.
Q: What is the organizational structure of the Archives?
A: The Council is the highest decision-making body of the Archives, responsible for considering and confirming all important activity plans and auditing financial and accounting reports. The number of members is limited to 20 (including organizations), and the first term of office is 3 years. There are corresponding statutes and bylaws to clarify the rights and obligations of members.
Q: Talk about the reality. Money is the basis for doing things, where does the funding come from?
A: We have considered six ways to fund the archives. One is the council dues. The 20 members of the Council (AIJI art (institutions), Cang Xin, Chen Cheng, Chen Mo, Cui Fu Li, Deng Le, Duan Lin, Ding Fenqi, Huang Xingrong, Li Yongzheng, Tang Peixian, Tian Meng, Wen Peng, Wu Fangzhou, Ye Caibao, Cha Changping, Zhang Xinyu, Zhang Xi, Zhang Yi, Zhang Yingchuan) have a fixed amount of contribution; Second, institutions and individual sponsorship. Currently there are A4 Art Museum, Guanghui Art Museum, Dapu Contemporary Art Museum, Deer Chun, He Ling, Chen Yufei, Kang Shuya Sophia Kidd (U.S.), Dong Kejun, Water Ghosts, money and donations are all welcome; third is the membership fee; this will be implemented after the Archives has been in operation for some time. The Archives is located in the professional field of academic research and promotion organizations, coupled with the special nature of the documents, so at present only for members (a specific group of people) open. In the future, when the documentary materials are fully digitized, the public can browse them by logging into the Archives’ website. Fourthly, the development of cultural and creative derivatives; fifthly, the Foundation’s funding application; sixthly, we have incorporated a cultural company, whose main role at present is to endorse the legitimacy of the Archives, and to strive for a benign operation to transfuse blood to the Archives in the future.
Q: What is the financial management of the Archives?
A: The finances are managed by specialized staff, and the accounts are reconciled and made public every six months. It is subject to the supervision and inquiries of the Council.
Q: It looks like you’ve given a lot of thought to how you’re going to do the archives.
A: More comprehensive, I guess. After all, I’ve been thinking about doing this for several years, and recently I’ve been brainstorming and listening to the advice of many experts and friends in the field. There must be some things that are not well thought out, and we will adjust them as we go along.
Rooftop-themed graffiti created by Water Ghost, January 2022
