[ad_1]
John Bonafede, an artist who was one of many “reperformers” collaborating in Marina Abramović’s legendary 2010 retrospective on the Museum of Fashionable Artwork (MoMA), The Artist Is Current, is suing the museum, claiming it’s answerable for seven incidents of sexual assault he allegedly skilled whereas performing there.
In keeping with Bonafede’s criticism, filed on Monday (22 January) in New York state’s supreme courtroom, the alleged incidents all happened whereas he was performing Imponderabilia (1977), a bit that entails a male performer and a feminine performer standing utterly nonetheless and nude on both facet of a slender doorway. In the course of the MoMA exhibition and different stagings of Imponderabilia—together with Abramović’s current exhibition on the Royal Academy in London—guests have been inspired to cross between the performers, which regularly results in incidental bodily contact between guests and the nude performers.
In keeping with Bonafede’s criticism, he was sexually assaulted seven instances by 5 completely different guests whereas performing Imponderabilia. The lawsuit claims that feminine performers of the piece, in addition to performers collaborating in different components of the exhibition, have been additionally victims of sexual assault and “non-consensual sexual touching frequently”.
In keeping with Bonafede’s criticism, he and round 35 different reperformers who had been employed by MoMA for the piece participated in a five-day coaching course of at a non-public residence owned by Abramović in upstate New York across the summer season of 2009. As a part of their coaching, the individuals “have been, amongst different austere practices, required to quick, keep full silence, chorus from sexual exercise and never use operating faucet water to wash”, based on the criticism. For Bonafede, the takeaway from the coaching was that he and the opposite performers “have been anticipated to ‘robust it out’, no matter what transgressions may happen throughout a dwell efficiency”.
Even so, the lawsuit claims that MoMA ultimately employed a “stage supervisor” and, round one month into the run of the efficiency piece, created a handbook that outlined a system to “alert MoMA employees in the event that they have been the victims of non-consensual groping or sexual touching, or felt endangered”. In keeping with the criticism, Bonafede reported 4 of the 5 alleged sexual assaults to MoMA employees, who in flip ejected the perpetrators. One in all them was a company member of the museum, based on the criticism, and following the assault his membership was reportedly revoked. Within the criticism, Bonafede says these experiences precipitated him to “endure years of emotional misery, and considerably harmed [his] psychological well being, physique picture and profession”.
Whereas the alleged incidents, which happened within the spring of 2010, would have beforehand fallen exterior the statute of limitations for submitting sexual misconduct claims, a legislation that was in impact in New York state in 2019 and till final November final yr—the Grownup Survivors Act—prolonged this era from three to twenty years. The criticism additionally claims that the alleged assaults fall underneath the purview of New York Metropolis’s Gender-Motivated Violence Safety Act, as all the alleged perpetrators have been males and Bonafede was a sufferer of particularly gender-based assaults. Particularly, male performers of Imponderabilia have been subjected to genital groping, the lawsuit claims, and feminine performers weren’t, though they suffered different types of non-consensual sexual contact.
Related accusations involving Abramović’s reperformers and guests to MoMA have been coated within the press on the time, with irreverent headlines like “Some at MoMA Present Overlook ‘Look however Don’t Contact’” and “Grope dopes inside MoMA”. Even so, solely minimal modifications have been made to the exhibition, past the hiring of a stage supervisor and formulation of a handbook.
Bonafede is in search of unspecified compensatory and punitive damages from MoMA, in addition to attorneys’ and consultants’ charges, plus different prices. Representatives for Bonafede and MoMA had not responded to requests for remark as of press time.
[ad_2]
Source link
