Thirty years ago, Peggy Phelan published Unmarked: The Politics of Performance (Routledge), in which she argued that the power of performance as an art forms lies in its inevitable disappearance. Published in 1993 as video technology was just becoming available, Unmarked referenced a different, earlier economy of performance art, one in which description was more important than documentation, and it was often difficult to find either, since most were tucked away in limited run catalogs. Within 15 years, the iphone and the internet had changed everything. Performance art no longer disappeared. Instead, it continued to live on social media platforms, artist websites, and art publications.
The workshop Performance on the Border of Visibility, led by Frans van Lent for the 2022 Flow Festival, was about returning to the idea of the unmarked/unremarkable performance. Over two days, van Lent encouraged participants to think about making public performances that disappeared into the public space. Only the artist would know that they were performing. The public audience who encountered the piece would not be aware that anything was different, out of the ordinary, or amiss.