There was something for everyone at The Age I Don’t Remember, the all-singing, all-dancing performance by hyper-energetic rising star, Nástio Mosquito, which played to a packed crowd at the ICA, London, on Friday. The charismatic Angolan artist—who was joint winner of the Future Generation Art Prize 2014—transformed the ICA’s theatre into a steamy, disorientating and cacophonous environment dotted with live musicians, video projections and, of course, the irrepressible Mosquito himself. The artist amply lived up to his name by frenetically buzzing back and forth through the audience, simultaneously declaiming and gyrating, and assuming multiple personalities ranging from the prophetic to the profane.
Added to this were proffered shots of whisky, bunches of bananas and a shower of stickers pouring from the ceiling, bearing slogans from the Nástio Manifesto—“FUCK ORIGINAL, BE GENUINE”, “FUCK CONCEPTS/DON’T BE COOL, BE RELEVANT”—that excited spectators stuck onto their heads, hands and clothes. The artist, who declares that he has “a profound respect for the tools of communication”, certainly can be said to have covered all bases. This full-on extravaganza was commissioned by the Emdash Foundation, which was founded by the Austrian collector Andrea Dibelius. The foundation supported Frieze Projects between 2011-13 and its last UK foray, organised by Peter Liversidge, involved a protest performance by 60 east London schoolchildren. Certainly this is not the last that London will be seeing of either Emdash or Mr. Mosquito…