Commissions
KAPUTT: The Academy of Destruction
A collaboration between the Live Art Development Agency (LADA), Sibylle Peters (Theatre of Research, Hamburg) and Tate Early Years and Families Programme (London).
KAPUTT: The Academy of Destruction was the first academy that included members of all ages as equal participants. Children, as well, as adults, explored and experimented, thought and acted together over four days at Tate Exchange, Tate Modern, London.
In times when the pressure to be productive has become ubiquitous, destruction often appears to be banned from the social realm. From an early age children learn that destructive behaviour will get them into trouble, while adults are urged to overcome their destructive impulses with techniques of selfcare, anger management and ‘positive thinking’. However, the same system of productivity, that urges us to be constructive and positive, is highly destructive in itself. Far from being a failure or a flaw of the system “Creative Destruction” has long been identified as a main feature and a crucial strength of our capitalist economy.
Revisiting histories and sharing practices, KAPUTT was interested in finding different approaches towards destruction, starting from our own fascination for it – as in fireworks, crash-testing, smashing guitars or throwing our cell phones against the wall. During their four days of working together all members of the Academy shared practices of destruction and looked at their own relation with destruction from their different angles, ages and places in society. They acknowledged destruction as a part of society and an ongoing process in life. And together they to claimed it as a cultural strategy that can be beautiful, manifold, care- and mindful.
Visitors were invited to take a trip through the Academy’s facilities: from its Reception to its Library, and on to its Assembly Hall where they watched the members of the Academy in action. Visitors were encouraged to create a research assignment in the Academy’s Common Room and receive their very own diploma.
KAPUTT’s academicians were Sibylle Peters, Heike Roms, Zoe Laughlin, Martin O’Brien, Malik Nashad Sharpe, Ansuman Biswas, Sam (Jazsam), Rubie (Gurrubie), Splendour & Najiba (Splenjiba), Tolu (Principal Tolu th G.O.A.T.), Ruqiya (R.P.H.D.) and Chese (Red Pool). The academicians are supported by the KAPUTT faculty members Hester Chillingworth, Katharina Duve, Zainab (Fidget Zalla) and Tyrell (the acrobatic zombie killer).
ART FORM_ Live Art
