A performance / installation exploring the different interpretations of the concept of ‘equality’ favoured by different parts of the political spectrum. On Friday 3 July 2015, a diverse group of six people took part in a simple performance at g39 in Cardiff – standing on a series of special plinths designed to raise each person up to an equal level, so that together they formed a perfect line.
Equality:
“There is nothing more unequal than the equal treatment of unequal people.” ― Thomas Jefferson (1743 – 1826)
Equality of Outcome:
“From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs!” ― Karl Marx (1875)
Equality of Opportunity:
“Everyone has the right to be unequal but to us every human being is equally important.” ― Margaret Thatcher (1975)
On Friday 3 July 2015, a diverse group of six people from the local area took part in a simple performance at g39 in Cardiff as part of the exhibition Island: Adaptation I & II. At a given moment, they stood for a few minutes on a series of special plinths designed to raise each person up to an equal level, so that together they formed a perfect line.
The plinths remained in the gallery as a monument to the six individuals whose heights they perfectly matched. Members of the public were invited to climb on the plinths, thereby highlighting the impossibility of fixing and maintaining a state of ‘equality’, because the outcome of ‘equality of opportunity’ is always inequality.
Commissioned by g39 in collaboration with Made in Roath. Featuring (in alphabetical order): Dan De’Ath, Heloise Godfrey-Talbot, Mustafa Hameed, Renn Hubbuck-Melly, Carol Ivory and Rosaleen Moriarty-Simmonds.
