Refining the absurd, artist Angus H Braithwaite’s practice frequently transforms the performing body into a ludicrous actor. Failures of Aviation, was a performance-lecture guided by physical props, consumed by the work to eventually become its memorial remnants. Braithwaite expounded upon a history of failed aviation – from burning blimps and failed journeys to tragic calamities. Animating his factual ingredients with reconstruction, farcical stagecraft and dry humor, the performance was both a clash and a parody of forms. ‘Sending up’ the traditional lecture and, with it, genres of public entertainment such as slapstick, mime and ritual folk performance, this work contained a mixture of instructive and destructive elements.

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