The Institute for Infinitely Small Things performs corporate commands where they occur in the urban landscape. We try to perform each command as literally as possible. There have been more than 15 performances of corporate commands in the U.S. and Canada in public and private commercial, urban spaces.
A corporate command is an instruction to you, the viewer, in the imperative form. Typically, corporate commands instruct you in abstract modes of being, i.e. “Live Like You Mean It”. The Institute is interested to see what happens when we take this language literally, right where it occurs.
Corporate commands we have performed include:
Simplify Your Finances | Rollover | Say it with Flowers | Give us four hours and we’ll save your life | Become a Believer | Enjoy Life | Add Lines | Run | Hop to It | Go Play
Upload your own at www.corporatecommands.com
Simplify Your Finances
For #ArtHackDay Boston 2012. Harvard Square, Cambridge. The Institute organized the wallets of passersby in order to simplify their finances.
Corporate Command #272: Simplify Your Finances from Infinitely Small on Vimeo.
Rollover
In Central Square, Cambridge, MA.
Say It With Flowers
In Baltimore, MD. The Institute staged an elaborate reading of Stephen King’s “IT” with flowers spewing from our mouths.
Give us four hours and we’ll save your life.
At Place des Arts, Montreal, Canada. The Institute stood next to the sign (in French) and solicited possersby, asking them if we could save their life in four hours or less. Most people did not need their lives saved until we met a young woman who had just broken up with her boyfriend. She was afraid to return to their apartment, but she had to get her things and move them to her sister’s house. This is what we helped her do. Afterwards, her sister invited us inside for tea.
Become a Believer
The Institute attempted to become believers in psychic phenomena. We interviewed passersby in Central Square, Cambridge, about their experiences with ghosts, ESP, voodoo and other forms of psychic phenomena.
Enjoy Life
A Sovereign Bank command in the Prudential Mall, Boston, MA. The Institute decided to Enjoy Life by relaxing on a picnic blanket with Doritos, drinking wine, and dancing. The dancing immediately prompted security to kick us out of the mall. We proceeded to a nearby Sovereign Bank ATM and continued to enjoy life.
Add Lines
For ProvFlux 2005. At the Providence Mall, the Institute organized 50 ProvFlux attendees to “Add Lines” going nowhere in the mall area. It took eight minutes for security to show up.
Run
For an hour, the Institute took turns running back and forth in front of the Nike Store in Boston, MA.
Hop to it
The Institute was joined by Theater MFA students from Towson University to perform this command in a Maryland mall.
Go Play
The Institute staged a game of speed chess outside the Gap in the Copley Square Mall, Boston, MA. The Gap gave us tacit permission as long as we did not take pictures of their window display (because, they said, it is their intellectual property). We played for 2 hours and involved 8 mall-goers in a game before mall security kicked us out.
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