At the upcoming Royal Academy of Arts exhibition, visitors will find their way blocked by two naked models, a man and a woman. The only way to gain access to the imminent Marina Abramovic exhibition is by squeezing themselves through the gap in the middle, the Telegraph reported.
Andrea Tarsia, the Royal Academy’s head of exhibitions told the media outlet, “The performance, called Imponderabilia, forces a confrontation between nakedness, and the gender, the sexuality, the desire.”
There is a separate entrance for those who are not comfortable squeezing through the nude performers.
The exhibition will run from September 23, 2023, to January 1, 2024. The exhibition has moments from the artist’s 50-year career through sculpture, video, installation and performance. Works such as The Artist is Present will be strikingly re-staged through archive footage while others will be reperformed by the next generation of performance artists, trained in the Marina Abramovic method.
However, the exhibition has received mixed reviews from the critics- while the Guardian called it “vital”, the Times said it was “remorseless.”
For Abramovic, it also has the power to be transformative. Experience this yourself through performances of Imponderabilia, Nude with Skeleton, Luminosity and The House with the Ocean View, according to the Royal Academy of Arts exhibition.
The exhibition includes Luminosity in which a naked woman is pinned to the wall in a crucifix pose while seated on a bicycle saddle, the Telegraph reported.