Connecting through something that makes you want to turn away

Lena Michalik

I am an artist and researcher living in Vienna,
born by the sea, raised in the mountains and tempered by metropolitan cities. In my work I merge my backgrounds architecture, crafting and performance into a new practice with which I deconstruct and explore material and immaterial spaces aiming to examine their social and ecological potentials. I focus on listening and sensing and utilize a range of media to encourage imagination and new perspectives.

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03 Connecting through something that makes you want to turn away

We fearlessly delve into the act of sneezing, daring to redefine its significance in a world where it often elicits disgust or fear. Through a playful exploration, we embark on a thought-provoking journey, seeking to assign sneezing a satisfying and liberating meaning. Our quest leads us to profound questions such as Is one death while having a Sneeze? How close is sneezing to the intensity of an orgasm? Is the whole world connected through a sneeze?

Year: 2022
Collaboration: Leah Dorner
Miro Hansen

In this captivating exploration, we lay bare the intricate parallels between sneezing and orgasm, life and death, and interconnectivity. Seemingly disparate experiences that share surprising connections. Undaunted by societal taboos, we assert that all acts share a raw and involuntary nature, demanding our attention and pushing us to the boundaries of vulnerability. Just as an orgasm releases waves of pleasure, a sneeze offers a momentary release from discomfort or irritation.

We bring ourselves to sneeze by making use of sneezing tools. In our sneezing case there lies pepper and dust next to cat hair and a Corona test, of course. The provoked sneeze catapults us into the depths of human surrender, making connections that defy conventional rules of behaviour and challenge social norms.

However, the " connecting through something that makes you turn away" goes beyond the individual experience. Our performance reveals the transformative power of sneezing, where the bodily fluids expelled transcend and thus question the border of the individual body shell.

Through numerous performative revelations with body, text and sound, we invite you to reflect on the profound interdependence and interconnectedness of our bodies. We share the microorganisms that colonise us, so in this consequence are we one organism sneezing in repeat?

- dropping down my body liquids

.. blossoming on you

spit, i can see breath and bacteria

.. blossoming on you

now shimmering on your shoulder

.. i gifted you my honor

.. soon you’ll give me truth

sneezing goodbye singularity

soaking in plurality

forming to a wet infectious creature

.. made through our youth

- ..... a hu hu
hunting one
oh ho
honoring infection

and die just for this very moment!-

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