Laughing Hole

María José Ribot (La Ribot)

16 August 2006

Installation and performance

La Ribot’s work blurs the traditional limits of contemporary dance and installation and performance art. In Laughing Hole, the duration of the action (6 hours), the site, the randomness of the movements and the improvisation of sound, combine to produce a piece that is more akin to durational performance art than to spectacle.

The treatment of the pieces of cardboard and the texts and their random occupation of the space create an existentialist narrative. The phrases allude to extreme situations of repression and incarceration, while the participants’ laughter, which provides the installation’s soundtrack, highlights man’s inalienable right to insubordination and personal freedom.