Premiering in the UK at the Iron House Gallery in Birmingham, MIKE is a three-hour durational performance which followsa physical labourer inhabiting a repurposed industrial space. Through a series of aimless tasks and subtle interactions, Michel invites the audience to reflect on the monotony and invisibility of menial work.
The setting of MIKE is integral to its atmosphere. Redbrick walls and concrete floors are scattered with work-related objects, including a lunchbox, safety helmet, tools and rolls of carpet, serving as reminders of the practical side of workspaces. In this context, labour is observed and aestheticised.
Michel enters the space wearing loose-fitting brown workwear and white ill-fitting socks. Her character exists somewhere between worker and artist, between reality and representation. She kicks a small metal case across the gallery floor, setting the tone for a peculiar, almost ritualistic display of everyday activities.
Throughout the performance, Michel moves through mundane tasks, cleaning her teeth, rearranging furniture, and popping to the toilet. However, occasional actions feel more focused on eliciting a reaction. During one moment, she writes notes for audience members and then begins to drag plastic chairs around the space, making loud, uncomfortable scraping noises. It is hard not to feel like a visitor at a zoo, observing an animal as it paces around its enclosure. At one point, she goes outside to pour water over herself and dries off under a large lamp, evoking a lizard regulating its temperature.
Her movements are deliberate yet seemingly random and unselfconscious. She seems caught in a loop of activities that feel both familiar and strange. Michel never speaks or smiles, maintaining a clown-like focus that evokes silent film performances. Her character appears stuck between performing labour and performing for an audience, creating an ambiguous space where meaning feels perpetually out of reach.
The duration of MIKE is crucial to its impact. As spectators, we are drawn into a similar rhythm of boredom and heightened awareness that characterises the life of low-wage labour. As the minutes tick by, we become aware of our restlessness. We cannot help but check our phones hoping that something, anything, will happen. In this way, we become part of the rhythm, feeling impatience and restlessness surface as the hours pass and our backs start to hurt. The piece mirrors everyday boredom and frustration of labour, as we wait for moments of change or surprise that rarely come.
Michel’s actions echo workers attempting to fill their shifts with purposeless activities, though her presence in a gallery shifts this dynamic. We pay attention to her simply because MIKE is labelled as art. This juxtaposition points to the discrepancy between the importance of menial work and how it is overlooked, making visible the routines and invisibility of those who perform essential, unglamorous jobs.
MIKE is not a piece that neatly delivers a message or emotion and is not for everyone. Perhaps the message lies in its lack of clarity, a reminder that much of life and labour unfolds without neat resolutions or interpretations.
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