Satirical Performance at Tate Modern Critiques Art World Power Structures

A fictional performance unfolds at Tate Modern during a Friday evening late opening in October 2014. The narrator encounters various disguised art world figures, including a possibly legendary American family of collectors in red Marni capes and a Chinese man whose paintings recently set Asian artist auction records. An angry Indian gentleman in a cravat shouts about his past presence in the Turbine Hall. A stage constructed from copies of Antonio Gramsci's Prison Notebooks is lowered by technicians who have worked for Reena Spaulings and Bernadette Corporation. The performance critiques the ArtReview Power 100 list, with references to Noam Chomsky and a reworked version of Courbet's L'Origine du monde. Doves released by Bernadette Corporation members fly into Richard Tuttle fabric sculptures and combust. Participants sing the Jennifer Lopez and Pitbull World Cup anthem while waving a tear gas canister, invoking Occupy Wall Street and Hong Kong. The scene is interrupted by the appearance of ArtReview's editor, who destroys a painting before disappearing. Figures speculated to be acquisition committees or private museum holders watch from a balcony. The Indian gentleman runs toward them, tearing the painting remnants with his Church's monkstrap shoes.