Kaldor Public Art Project 05: Moorman and Paik 1976

Moorman + Paik

22–26 March 1976, exhibition and performances: Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide; Adelaide Festival Theatre plaza; Adelaide Festival Theatre rooftop; Elder Park, Adelaide

1–11 April 1976, exhibition and performances: Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney; Coventry Gallery, Sydney; Sydney Opera House forecourt

Pioneers of avant-garde video and performance, artist Nam June Paik and cellist Charlotte Moorman collaborated in Adelaide and Sydney during 1976 on an exhibition and series of more than 40 performances for Project 5. The exhibition included a selection of Paik’s famous video sculptures – constructions from TV sets that screened his experiments with synthesised video and feedback – and was accompanied by artistically and physically daring performances written by Paik and their contemporaries, including Jim McWilliams, Joseph Beuys, Yoko Ono and John Cage. They captured the attention of the media as Moorman performed naked with a cello carved from ice, swinging from a 12-metre trapeze, smothered in 13 kilograms of chocolate fudge, and suspended from balloons drifting above the Sydney Opera House forecourt.