Why Is Shia LaBeouf Trapped In an Elevator at Oxford University?

It's another live-streaming moment for the actor-artist.

Shia LaBeouf, Rönkkö & Turner. Photo: still from YouTube.

There’s never a dull moment for Shia LaBeouf and his collaborators Nastja Säde Rönkkö and Luke Turner. When the actor-turned-experimental-performance artist isn’t putting paper bags over his head and declaring that he isn’t famous anymore, he’s getting stuck inside elevators—on purpose.

LaBeouf, Rönkkö, and Turner are occupying an elevator at the Oxford Union debate society for the two 24-hour periods on either side of a talk he’s scheduled to give at the UK university this evening at 8 p.m. What’s more, you can watch the stunt, titled #ELEVATE, thanks to a live stream on the Oxford Union YouTube channel. Just make sure you don’t suffer from claustrophobia.

Visitors to the building are invited to join the collaborative trio in the elevator to engage in conversation, debate, and a few shared moments of cramped discomfort.

Shia LaBeouf, Nastja Säde Rönkkö, and Luke Turner at CalArts on February 4, 2016. Photo: Vivi Fragou, courtesy the artists.

Shia LaBeouf, Nastja Säde Rönkkö, and Luke Turner at CalArts on February 4, 2016.
Photo: Vivi Fragou, courtesy the artists.

“Visitors. . . are invited to address the artists, the debating chamber, and the internet, so that their collective voices may form an extended, expansive and egalitarian Oxford Union address,” reads a statement from the artists and Oxford Union.

LaBeouf isn’t new to the concept of live streaming or to durational art projects: this November, he parked himself at the Angelika Film Center in New York City and screened every film he’d ever acted in for the aptly-named project #ALLMYMOVIES. In 2014, he sat at Cohen Gallery in Los Angeles and invited visitors to interact with him. He later claimed to have been sexually assaulted during the performance, which was titled #IAMSORRY.

The trio will vacate the premises as of 9 a.m. February 20.


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