Alex Cecchetti and Mark Geffriaud

In the collaborations John Cage made with Merce Cunningham, music and dance unfolded simultaneously but independently, interacting in new and unpredictable ways. Alex Cecchetti and Mark Geffriaud’s 2011 game-cum-performance The Police Return to the Magic Shop—which together with a sculptural object constitutes their contribution to Jeu de Paume’s experimental Satellite program—is based on a similar principle. During the course of these events, two actors recite separate monologues that interweave to resemble a dialogue. Their soliloquies are likewise independent of their actions, which consist of repeatedly moving objects around the space in accordance with rules that are revealed as the performance takes its course. Observers will note a blue trunk pushed about on the ground, a white paper bag crumpled and thrown across the room, and three stones picked up and rolled like dice.

Yet although each actor must recite their lines in a particular order, they are free to move the objects in any order they wish. As a result, their words and actions constantly generate different combinations and—on occasion—magically coincide. “More, more, there you go,” one actor might say, just as the other happens to be tentatively sliding a metal rod along the bottom edge of the wall. What initially comes across as a succession of disjointed actions and words gradually becomes a spellbinding commentary on the barriers of interpersonal communication, the absurdity of the routines governing our everyday lives, and the hiatus between word and deed. Attenuating these oppositions and constraints is the element of chance, which, as Cage and Cunningham demonstrated, can generate unexpected richness and variety.