INSTRUCTIONS
In order to play this motif 840 times in succession, it would be advisable to prepare oneself beforehand, and in the deepest silence, by serious immobilities.
Erik Satie

First action. A plant piss, tied to the stomach with sticky tape wrapping. I feed the plant with two drip tubes, the water comes out thin without stopping. People passing by, but don’t understand what is happening. We are in the market of a small European eastern city. I have wet in my pants.
Second action. From the mouth, tied to the teeth, start wires that hold, closely tied to the branches of another plant, which suddenly falls to the ground. The thin link is broken. Wires hanging from the teeth.
Third action. This time the body is exposed behind the showcase of a clothing store, in the city center. Again a plant, no movement. Till with a knife I cut the ivy, whose branches are woven into the hair. It seems suddenly.
My name is Jelena Vasiljev, like anybody else starts from three separate actions realized within a single day, in different places and at different times: it’s a reflection on stillness and waiting, a mute dialogue of a body that is exposed to the gaze, surrounding himself with a live element like a plant.
In the three non-actions – which have taken place without any warning, more similar to an apparition than to a performance – there is the consciousness of appearing and embarrassment in it, the discomfort of the body conscious of being exposed but that has chosen the clothes to be exposed, waiting for something that should happen but doesn’t, the body sheathed in something that holds it, the plant as a living element – plants that are part of the house where I live – that is offering something intimate and personal, tied to the body but other respect to the body.