А. Монастырский, Н. Панитков, И. Макаревич, Е. Елагина, С ...

audience, and separated the participants (S.H., A.M. and S.R.) from viewers. Inside the box, invisible to
the audience, there was a working tape recorder with a 45-minute-long tape. It was empty, with three
occasional technical noises like clicks and humming: in the middle of the recording there was a sound of
rewinding tape (about one minute long) and in the beginning and the end there were a couple of button
clicks.
Behind participants‘ backs in a windowpane there was a square black box (also used in the "Voices"
action) with three electric torches of different shapes protruding from it (for description of these electric
torches see text "Engineer Wasser and engineer Licht").
In the room there were several black boards with letters and numbers, like those on car license plates.
Moscow
6 th of February, 1985
A.Monastyrski, S.Hangsen, S.Romashko
Viewers:
I.Kabakov, I.Bakshtein, I.Nakhova, Yu.Leiderman, A.Zhigalov, N.Abalakova, D.Prigov, V.Mochalova,
L.Rubinstein, G.Witte, E.Dobringer, S.Letov + 3 persons
37. JUPITER (4.33)
In the room where the action lasting 4 houres and 33 minutes took place, besides usual house interior
there were six black shields on the walls with emblematic images of paralinguistic signs. These included:
1) "Time" – a man looking at wrist watch; 2) "Wipe your ears" or "Stop your ears" - a man with fingers
stuck into his ears; 3) "Fifty-fifty" – a one-eyed man; 4) "Yes" – a man with naked teeth; 5) "No" – a man
with a black hole instead of mouth; 6) "No" – a man with hanging out tongue.
The paralinguistic meaning of last four emblems is optional and only possible in the sequence with first
conventional two. A shield with "twinkling man" split the emblematic sequence into semantic (1,2,3 – to
½) and emotional (3 - to ½, 4,5,6). Besides these shields, there was also a rectangular black box with four
turned-on electric torches on the windowpane and a square black box with 3 electric torches (used in the
"Translation" action) on the shelf. During the live musical performance only these lights and a table lamp
were lit. In the pauses (during playback of recordings) the ceiling light was switched on.
The action consisted of a series of musical improvisations with a common "minimalist" theme, in which
the following performers took part: A.Monastyrski (pianoforte), S.Letov (fagotto), S.Romashko (endblown
flute and triple-tone whistle) and S.Haensgen (cross flute). Besides them, pre-recorded tapes were
used in the course of action. Two of them – "The Duet" by S.Letov and A.Monastyrski and "The Trio" by
S.Letov, S.Haensgen and A.Monastyrski – were played back during the pauses; they were recorded prior
to the action and consisted of improvisation to one theme. Another phonogram titled "The Trains; The
Barrel" (recorded by A.Monastyrski in an area near train station "Yauza") occasionally overlapped the
live performance. It consisted of noises of passing-by trains melting into half-hour long sound of a barrel
rolling down an asphalt road. Besides instruments and phonograms, a TV set sitting on the piano was also
used during the action as a source of light, sound and images. Also on the piano, on the right from the TV
set there were large headphones used by Monastyrski to repeat after TV news broadcast "Vremya"
(Time). On the piano‘s music stand there was a glass-sided black sheet of paper with a sticker in its center
saying "C.A. Jupiter (4.33)".
The action was carried out according to the following scheme (timekeeping was supervised by
G.Kizewalter who imposed phonograms over the live sound to signal either the gradual termination of
live playing or beginning of a new stage of musical performance):
1. 18:00 – 18:10 – Phonogram "The Duet". TV is off.
A.: 18:10 – 18:55 – the first 45-minutes-long stage of live performance. TV is off. Phonogram "The
Trains; The Barrel" is not used.
2. 18:55 – 19:05 – Phonogram "The Trio". TV is off.
B.: 19:05 – 19:50 – The second 45-minutes-long stage of live performance. TV is on, displaying clear
white screen without sound. First 45 minutes of phonogram "The Trains; The Barrel" are played back.