In a series of text recitals, Nora tells stories through historical facts, philological ponderings and poetic means. For The Assembly of the Hyperboreans, she will tell a story about the different functions of the mouth, its cultural history, a drowned girl, and the taste of rubber.
The rescue-Anne doll is said to be the most kissed face in the world. She is modelled after the death mask of a drowned teenager found floating in the river Seine. Though the pathologist ruled her death a suicide, an impish smile rested on her lips. After the death mask became popularised a a piece of decor, actresses took to modelling their look after it. For a while, the look of the dead girl was the erotic ideal.
What an annoyance it must be, to be clumsily resuscitated by thousands of pawing strangers. The plastic sternum convexed and concaved to the rythm of the Bee Gees’ Staying Alive.
Nora Joung (b. 1989) lives and works and is based in space (and time!). She holds a MFA from the Academy in Oslo. Her work is often centred around the relationship between language and images: Where one may become surrogate for the other, semiotic shifts are suggested and the fight for primacy over the other is constant. She also works as a critic.
The performance is a part of the Assembly of the Hyperboreans
