‘OPEN’
Curtains, Window, Egg
KIMVI & Marianne Papst
Kaihua Art Village
Zhejiang Province. China
2026
Part of ‘The 22nd OPEN International Performance Festival
“Shall I open the curtains?”
This was the question my roommate, Swiss performance artist Marianne Papst, asked as we woke. Twenty-four hours earlier we had been strangers; now, through our invitation to participate in this year’s 22ND OPEN International Performance Festival, we were slowly becoming friends—OPENing ourselves to each other through exchanges of stories of our lives. On this last morning of waking together, I realized I wanted Marianne and me to be in dialogue with each other, to embody the ethos of our newfound friendship and the openness of our performance community, the performance took place directly in front of our bedroom window, it began with Marianne opening all the curtains in our room , whilst I was outside opening the windows of an abandon house.
The concept and meaning of “OPEN” made me ask: what does it mean? To be OPEN to possibilities; to OPEN ourselves to vulnerability; to OPEN ourselves to exposure to all elements.
OPEN our eyes.
OPEN our mouths.
OPEN the curtains.
OPEN the door.
OPEN the window.
OPEN our arms.
OPEN our legs.
OPEN oneself to others.
I held the egg in my mouth. With my hand I cracked it, and the egg revealed itself: two halves resting, one in each open hand. The egg became a ritual object. Its shell is a boundary; cracking it is an act of opening and revelation. The two halves resting in two open hands suggest exchange, equality, offering, and two artists meeting as two halves of a dialogue. Eggs also carry associations of beginning, potential, and life—appropriate for a festival called OPEN and for a new friendship. And because the egg must be broken in order to be opened, the gesture acknowledges that openness is not simple: it can be nourishing, exposing, destructive, and tender at once.
