PERFORMERS’ REFLECTION AFTER THE INTERVENTION

“The intervention lasted for 6 hours, during which time we went for a walk, even for a coffee/beer, equipped with smartphones. The only rule was to use technological devices  for all communication and for solving any situation that occurs on the way.

As a person who had never owned a smartphone & hardly ever used one, the situation was very foreign and new to me. My attention was focused on “cyberspace” and it was getting narrower and narrower until I was almost unaware of my surroundings immersed in the “space of internet possibilities”. I felt disoriented for a while afterwards, like when leaving a cinema after a movie.”

(Simon)

“Oh man, so many options, I could miss some if I look away … wait, I just send this message .. where are we – where’s the map now? … I’m calling Radharani …this video is really funny … I take selfies … and I take more selfies … oh, a cyclist – I only noticed him on the camera as he has already passed by me … Hey, where’s Simon, he hasn’t sent any message for more than 10 min … what is this stream on the camera, let me google … aha, ok, a beer – I call over phone to order, why is the waiter so surprised – it’s normal, isn’t it?! WTF? …”

(Tomaž)

“It’s amazing how completely unselective and disconnected in purpose my thinking has become: you type and click whatever comes to hand, whether you’re interested or not. You do things that you would never do with normal concentration and purpose (e.g. you type Jan Plestenjak, which you can’t stand, and seek when he was born; you click on a news story about hockey; etc.). Basically, the whole flow of thought is more like ‘in the lingo’ – the engine is running for the sake of running, with no internal impulse & no aim. You just accept everything that comes up, with no judgement at all, and at the same time you don’t care – because it actually all passes you by (you don’t take it to mind/heart, for real, you don’t memorize, you act as if it doesn’t affect you)… the indifference grows… I also felt the inability to react normally to the perceived: during the intervention and even after it was over. I still have a blurred vision, two days after the intervention, I just can’t look out clearly into the distance, out of myself …

In fact, I have no real memory of the walk and what happened. I don’t know what the others were doing or what happened when, in what sequence (e.g. I only know that we passed the ski jump from photos I saw later, although I know the path/park well). I felt a certain spatial disorientation the whole time (those 4 frames from the Whatsapp). … And not to mention the constant fiddling with the touch screen – turning of the screen, clicking in vain, so annoying … It makes you ill …”

(Radharani)