The old worry, revisited

On Friday July 26 at 7:30pm, JOAN presents The old worry, revisited, an original performance by Ajani Brannum inspired by Ulises Carrión’s 1981 artist book and lecture Gossip, scandal, and good manners. The performance is presented in conjunction with the exhibition, a bookwork in many places, which is on view through August 9.

Conceptually framed as a field study, Gossip, scandal, and good manners enlisted a group of Carrión’s friends to circulate gossip about the artist himself around Amsterdam over a three-month period, from March to June 1981. Participants documented the dissemination of these fabricated narratives in notebooks, reflecting on the difficulties of inventing convincing stories and finding appropriate moments to introduce them into conversation. Yet their greatest challenge lay in sustaining the circulation of the gossip after its initial transmission. According to their reported findings, these stories were often met with indifference.

Carrión’s project exemplifies his approach to language beyond conventional and literary forms. Following the experiment, he produced an eponymous artist book, delivered a lecture at the University of Amsterdam, and created a video adaptation, all in 1981. Drawing on material collected during the study, these works presented the participants’ observations through diagrams distinguishing gossip from rumors and slander, alongside visual references to film and opera. Reflecting on the project in the artist book, Carrión wrote: “My intention was to test as an individual and as a public image, to check the boundaries of my territory and my endurance. I consciously chose to do it by means of marginal, erratic, uncontrollable channels.”

In The old worry, revisited, Brannum departs from the questions raised by Gossip, scandal, and good manners, exploring how information circulates through social groups and serves as a conduit for the construction of both collective and individual identities.

Ajani Brannum is an undisciplinary artist based in Los Angeles. He has worked with a range of choreographers and performance-makers, including Miguel Gutierrez, Deborah Hay, Will Rawls, and Elliot Reed. He has shared performances, workshops, and lectures at REDCAT, ODC, Human Resources Los Angeles, Materials & Applications, Highways Performance Space, Los Angeles Performance Practice, as well as in classrooms, on tabletops and screens, and when no one is looking. Born in Anchorage, Alaska, he holds an AB in English and a Certificate in Dance from Princeton University, and a PhD in Culture and Performance from University of California, Los Angeles.