“Theoretical gore” is the terminology for the road markings in the US that designate the triangular area between the main highway and an off-ramp. This space of demarcation is not a warning zone, but an indicator that one road has already diverged from another. In this performance, Lex Brown (2025 Fellow) explores this symbolism and the metaphorical “off-ramp” we find ourselves on with regard to emergent politics. The installation consists of a scene of imminent wreckage: a cardboard Tesla Cybertruck heading straight for an industrial fan, careening through the space, ripping up a painted backdrop of astroturf-green grass. The artifice of the scene calls to mind a cheap version of Hollywood stagecraft, evoking the flimsy authority of the current political system and its relationship to entertainment. The artist will voice and wrestle with the ideologies that dominate the current political discourse in the U.S. through speech, song and utterance inducing an incongruent slippage both in language and in topic.

Written and designed by
Lex Brown

Performed by
Lex Brown with Val Wandja

With dramaturgical direction from
Chiara Cimmino and Valero Garaffa

Theoretical Gore is part of the 2025 SPAZIO GRIOT program, The System Concedes Nothing Without Demand.