Two artists explore the link between corn starch and the neo-liberal society:
“Our society is becoming opaque, intransparent, undecipherable. One big blob of corn starch!”
Four years ago, performance artist Gosie Vervloessem and choreographer-dancer Einat Tuchman grappled with 17 kg of corn starch in the show Maïzena*. The show degenerated into one big mess, in which the corn starch alternated between being liquid and solid. It was never controllable and always amorphous. The show became a trip through non-Newton land, where everything is transient, with blurred boundaries and territories that are difficult to mark out. In other words, where freedom and creativity reign supreme.
Four years on, Vervloessem and Tuchman explore the link between corn starch and neo-liberal society:
“Our society is becoming opaque, intransparent, undecipherable. One big blob of corn starch! Like The Blob***, neo-liberalism devours everything in its path, but only in the interest of self-glorification. The formless is no longer a place of creative freedom, but rather a huge jelly in which we flail about helplessly to keep ourselves from drowning.”
*Everyone is familiar with corn starch (a.k.a. Maïzena) as the kitchen ingredient, a binding agent for the perfect sauce or pudding. It has magical properties: it is a liquid that defies Newton's law. Corn starch (mixed with water) solidifies when you start stirring or kneading it, but when you stop, it reverts back to its shapeless liquid.
** A Newtonian fluid is the name used in continuum mechanics for certain fluids, like gases and liquids, that behave linearly towards mechanical stresses, like shear stresses. In a Newtonian fluid, the gradient of the flow rate in the substance is directly proportional to the shear stress in the shear plane. Most everyday liquids, such as water, are Newtonian fluids. Fluids which do not fall within the remit of the above definition are referred to as non-Newtonian fluids.
***The Blob is a horror movie from 1958 in which a shapeless mass ruthlessly swallows a country town.
Concept, performance: Einat Tuchman, Gosie Vervloessem
Outside eye: Petra Van Brabandt
Production: De Pianofabriek
With the support of: VGC and Axixa
