Marina and Ulay

The Kickstarter 'Projects We Love' email told me about performance artist Marina Abramovic's endeavour to fund 'a living, breathing museum for performance art, where attendees not only visit, but participate.' Marina is famous of-course for (amongst many other things) her performace piece The Artist Is Present which in 2010 broke MoMA attendance records and which saw Abramović sitting in a chair facing a succession of her fans who sat across from her in silence for as long as they wished.

In the 1970s and 80s Marina had an intense romantic and artistic relationship with another performance artist Ulay. They ended their relationship in 1988 on the Great Wall of China with a performance piece (a 'spiritual journey') which involved each of them walking from opposite ends and meeting in the middle where they said goodbye to each other. They've rarely seen each other since. But twenty two years later, Ulay made a surprise visit to the opening of Marina's show. The emotional connection between the two of them made for an incredibly intense moment.