“ our bodies are borrowed.
our joys are borrowed.
our tears are borrowed.
our fates are borrowed. ”
We are. Introducing PHILTH HAUS.
PHILTH HAUS is a collective of artists, performers, musicians, and conceptualizers. They are provoking, prodding, and producing a body of work that forces audiences to confront their learned experiences head on.
I first encountered a PHILTH HAUS performance inside an intimate Boston living room. A single blacklight hung from the ceiling and illuminated the wax castings of Andra’s hands and feet that lay on the floor. Beside those sat a shattered porcelain toilet. A centerpiece. That pungent smell of warm ivory wax was as unforgettable as Andra’s appetite for it. Andra G.G., the founder of PHILTH HAUS, entered with their accompanying musicians, each one deliberate and calm, and gave an unrelenting, hour-long noise music experience to an enamored audience. Tortured, agonizing, curious, and beautiful, their presence created a setting for a unique exploration and confrontation with the self as Andra chewed on their various wax appendages.
Guided by exercises in vulnerability, Andra’s recent collection of work and series of performances explore the body as a simultaneously fragile entity and vehicle for control.
Last month, PHILTH HAUS hit the road with a friend, an armful of jewelry, fake nails from CVS, and that same shattered toilet. With 80’s music blasting, they made way to Manhattan to distribute XO UTERO | megaZine ii. In front of a prominent Chelsea gallery, their work was distributed and performed to the audience of passerbys.
“This is really great, but cannot be left in front of the gallery,” said the Pace Gallery attendant as he ushered Andra down the block.
In a recent interview with Andra, they described their work as one that can inflict a “soft bruise” whereby the painfulness of confrontation allows for growth, understanding, and awareness.
In anticipation of their upcoming exhibition, we sat down with PHILTH HAUS (in the Harvard Carpenter Center’s janitor closet, no less) to discuss their upcoming show, their inspiration, and their knack for street scavenging. At The Solo Show, we can certainly expect a series of soft bruises. On December 2nd, the Harvard Student Art Collective presents PHILTH HAUS with performances by experimental noise collective Lucretius (2019). Doors are at 7pm with performances throughout the evening.
The exhibition will run from December 2nd-8th 2017 at SOCH (59 Shepard St. Cambridge). The gallery will be open from 8am-12am
Installation View, PHILTH, “Bathroomb” (2017)
This cannot be experienced online. Your presence is MANDATORY. RSVP here.
This content was originally published on BostonArtReview.com with the expressed permission of Authors Jameson Johnson and Haley Albert. To read the full interview with Andra G.G. from PHILTH HAUS visit http://bostonartreview.com/reviews/philth-haus/
