27 Gnosis
27 Gnosis, 2012 installation/performance dOCUMENTA (13), Kassel
and a second iteration developed for theaters presented at Playground Festival, STUK, Leuven, 2013 and The Kitchen, NY, 2013
In this destabilizing, combinatorial game show set within a massive mud mound, the Rigid Desgnator and Modifa, The Modifier, direct a group of 27 players who compete to develop a series of confounding propositions derived from the interplay of a set of 27 "gnoses", vaguely nose-like sculptural forms each representing a heuristic or conceptual tool for attaining experiential knowledge. The language system of the game borrows structurally from the ontologies of 17th Century taxonomic languages as well as elements of modern constructed languages such as Ithkuil, aUi, and Ygede. Unfolding unpredictably in a mixture of linguistic contortion, world-building, and dance, the game fuses Portnoy's breed of Relational Stalinism with his background in experimental comedy.
Game structure and choreography in collaboration with Kira Nova (formerly Ieva Misevičiūtė) Performers: Kira Nova, Michael Portnoy Architecture in collaboration with Christian Wassmann Costumes by threeASFOUR Scent by Nasomatto
Commissioned and produced by dOCUMENTA (13)
Review of 27 Gnosis at The Kitchen, Frieze Magazine
