Block Universe performance art festival 2017

The world has a difficult relationship with performance art. It is the rebellious teen of fine art forms: unpredictable, misunderstood, prone to self-indulgence. At its worst, it can be comically silly. Film director Paolo Sorrentino satirises the genre perfectly in his 2013 The Great Beauty, when a performance artist 'Talia Concept' repeatedly smashes her head into a wall and then proclaims 'I'm an artist. I don't have to explain.'

Recently, performance has been creeping into the mainstream. The Tate dedicated a whole exhibition and a great deal of space to it. The new trend for 'immersive' exhibitions forces visitors to become participants. Marina Abramović is so successful she has become a veritable brand, backed by a 10-strong team and with Adidas sponsorship.

This May, London will be treated to a festival of performance art, as Block Universe returns to the capital for a third year. This week-long celebration is an attempt to bring the art form to the masses. Performances and workshops will pop up all over London's major cultural institutions, including the Royal Academy and Somerset House.

This year’s theme explores ideas surrounding political bodies, both personal and public, addressing identity politics and notions of nationhood – especially pertinent in the wake of Brexit.

We're looking forward to Young In Hong's choreography, which will take place in the public square of the Royal Academy of Arts courtyard. The London-based Korean created 5100: Pentagon, modelled on South Korea's Gwangju uprising of 1980. More than 600 people who were demonstrating against the Chun Doo-hwan regime may have died at the hands of government troops. This project brings to light an unexplored period in history by re-creating an intensive moment, performed repetitively (and differently) by different participants each time.

Feminist Swedish artist Stina Nyberg will present Shapes of States, which traces the historical and political writing of the body by connecting Swedish public health ideologies from the 1920s with contemporary training ideals. While Rory Pilgrim’s collaboration with a youth group exploring sci-fi robotic support systems of care set in a Quaker meeting hall.

There's so much more to explore: click here for the full programme.