ABSTRACT
Traditional artistic approaches often are regarded as exclusive. High culture exists as a distinct sphere of activity enacted by and for an elite, which may explain the frequent disinterest of its practitioners with works in the details of ordinary, everyday life. The cultural sphere is, for traditionalists, that which elevates beyond the material and petty interests of daily existence. Many of German choreographer and performance artist Angie Hiesl’s works take inspiration from the urban landscape in which they are embedded. X-times people chair occasions to consider what makes and represents a city, thereby contributing to a wider discourse about urban environments. Theorists of the “urban everyday,” such as Georg Simmel or Walter Benjamin, often wrote about city life in terms of an incessant and brutal agitation of the nerves. X-time people chair is emancipatory in defying the trend toward youth in cultural performance and in seeking to reclaim public spaces for an older generation.
