Advance and Stack, 1978-80

This series began as a single artwork titled, “Advance and Stack” in 1978 by Lynn Book.  Originally conceived of as a 5-day durational, site-specific piece as a meditation on labor. Book designed the project for 4 performers to be carried out in the surrounding park and grounds of the Memphis College of Art.  By the spring of 1979, Book created another work on the theme of labor that was realized by an audience attending a larger event called, “An Evening of Performance Pieces”, conceived of by Book and co-created with Katherine Mitchell and Margo Adams involving over 50 students, faculty and others from the larger Memphis arts community.  A third “Advance and Stack” iteration was another durational, site-specific work for 4 performer-laborers that was commissioned by the fledgling Memphis in May Festival located on the bluff of the Mississippi River. Focusing again on aspects of labor not visible, of art itself being a labor, Book devised an extended walking map for each performer along 4 parallel arteries in downtown Memphis including Union and Madison.  Informed by art historical depictions of laborers in 19th century European paintings, Book constructed perishable objects that referenced haystacks that each performer wore on their backs.  The walking action terminated at the bluff where the festival was taking place, but the performers, unperturbed, made their way past the festivities, down to the river’s edge to ritually toss the objects of their labor into it.  This Collection is comprised primarily of black and white photographs shot by Tim Glover, color slides shot by Chuck Book, project notes, and in the case of “Advance and Stack II” a short black and white video, shot by Mose Person who documented fragments of “An Evening of Performance Pieces”.

Advance and Stack I, 1978, Mphs-MCA, durational site specific performance:

Initially, “Advance and Stack” was a 5-day durational performance work, conceived of as a meditation on labor by Lynn Book, who was particularly interested in how ‘work’ - its materials and means - was often invisible.  Enacted by 4 art students in November, 1978 from Monday - Friday at noon, it was designed to be viewed from a second floor open atrium of the architecturally significant art school building.  This vantage point afforded perspectives that were both casual (a passer-by might catch a glance) and powerful (the remote view gave one a sense of observing formations that might not otherwise be noticed).  The large flexible planes that the ‘laborers’ carried and placed in varying arrangements on the large portico entrance to the school were thick foam rubber pads.  Each day’s action was mapped from a different starting point and involved a distinct ritual placement of the planes and their bodies.  The first 4 days were devised with more formal intention, however, the 5th and final day of the action was directly influenced by my learning of the mass suicide in Jonestown, Guyana occurring earlier in the week.  Given that most of the 900 people who died were from the U.S. I arranged for another student to drive her Volkswagen ‘beetle’ (representing ‘America’) with performers and pads piled inside. Parking on the sidewalk, the group ‘poured’ out of the tiny car and solemnly made their way up the long staircase.  The performers were directed to arrange their pads in sequence, lie face down on them, place one arm around the next person and remain motionless for as long as they could tolerate the icy rain that was coming down. It felt like an eternity.

Advance and Stack II, 1979, Mphs-MCA, audience participatory work:

In the spring of 1979, Lynn Book created another work on the theme of labor that was realized by an audience attending a larger event called, “An Evening of Performance Pieces”, conceived of by Book and co-created with Katherine Mitchell and Margo Adams involving over 50 students, faculty and others and attended by approximately 250 people from the larger Memphis arts community.  In this iteration of what was now becoming a series, “Advance and Stack II” was devised as an audience participatory work.  Book gathered dozens of everyday objects, from people, from thrift stores, from her own home that she organized into large boxes stationed outside of the auditorium doors of the MCA.  The audience was invited to select one and hold onto it for several ensuing performances before being invited to “advance towards the stage with the objects… and stack it with the others.  Book was interested in the hidden life of feeling states in object relations as having equal value as the culminating assemblage of material goods that the audience members arranged on the stage, gaining status as a kind of performance of labor and affect.

Advance and Stack III, 1980, Mphs-MphsMayFest, durational, multi-site specific performance:

The third and final iteration of this series by Lynn Book pushed further into durational, geographical and historical aspects of labor.  In “Advance and Stack III”, the artist investigated labor contained in the urban fabric itself where the inner workings of buildings, businesses and people’s histories were inflected.  Commissioned by the fledgling Memphis in May Festival located on the bluff of the Mississippi River, Book devised an extended walking map for 4 performer-laborers along 4 parallel streets in downtown Memphis (an area that has since been razed to build a baseball stadium).  The walkers carried ‘haystacks’ on their backs to signify both effort in their work, but also a reference to ‘forgotten’ labor of workers and gleaners in surrounding fields and pastures.  The walking action terminated at the bluff where the festival was taking place, but the performers, unperturbed, made their way past the festivities, down to the river’s edge to ritually toss the objects of their labor into it.

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