Photo: © 2014 Patrick McMullan Company, Inc.
Is Shia LaBeouf set to unseat James Franco as Hollywood’s crossover performance art king? He’ll get his shot this week.
Between September 8 and September 20, LaBeouf used the Nike+ app to send his Twitter followers a cryptic message, spelled out one character at a time by his jogging routes around Los Angeles: “#METAMARATHON.” Now, according to the most recent tweet in the series, the mysterious hashtag is also the title of LaBeouf’s debut performance art event, slated to take place on September 25 at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam.
Luke Turner, Shia LaBeouf, and Nastja Säde Rönkkö, #METAMARATHON (2014).
Photo: Courtesy the artists.
Sure enough, a visit to the Stedelijk’s website confirms it. Beginning at 2 p.m. on September 25, “Shia LaBeouf will embark upon a metamarathon around the perimeter of the Stedelijk Museum. Visitors are invited to participate. Running shoes optional.” The performance is a collaboration with the Finnish conceptual artist Nastja Säde Rönkkö and the British performance artist Luke Turner. The trio previously collaborated on another social media augmented performance art project, #IAMSORRY, for which LaBeouf sat in a room with a paper bag over his head ignoring the public’s attempts at engaging him.
Luke Turner, Shia LaBeouf, and Nastja Säde Rönkkö, #IAMSORRY (2014).
Photo: Courtesy the artists.
While there are few details about #METAMARATHON, we sincerely hope for LaBeouf’s sake that he will not be wearing a bag over his head. We doubt he’s capable of Marina Abramović-level pain endurance.