I ask Shia how he got into surrealist performance art?
‘I realized with a shudder, the misuse of my creative talents during that spiritually and ethically bereft Indiana Jones film I was in. I told Harrison Ford during the after-party about my surrealist performance art plans, hoping for support, but he laughed at me, and said I was a pretentious little prick with zero artistic talent. I bet he is laughing on the other side of his face now, as I take the performance art world by storm.
The money from my acting has given me the luxury to follow my heart. That is hart spelt h.a.r.t. I decided not to be pressured to conform to societal norms for a highly talented and creative leading Hollywood A-lister, but instead, dedicate myself to creative and political activist expressionism through surrealist art. So I have bought a truckload of canned goods, found this hedge, and I will climb in, grab onto the trunk of a hawthorn bush tightly, and will be here for 9 years. It will be a fairly passive exhibit, where all I will do is occasionally orally make a ‘ping’ noise.
I ask Shia could he explain what his art signifies and who is his target audience?
‘I haven’t told anyone where this hedge is and the fact that nobody will witness my exhibit doesn’t bother me. I never got into art to be mainstream or to prove anything to anyone else except to myself. Also if I did have an audience I wouldn’t want to patronize them by giving too much away. Good art is about raising questions, not providing answers, isn’t it? So I leave it up to others, if there were any, to interpret my art.’
I’m intrigued to find out what the future holds for Shia creatively after this exhibit?
Shia, ‘I will not be returning to the shallow mimicry of acting, as it turns my soul into a seagull that has fallen into a bucket of urine that subsequently freezes over trapping the bird unable to fly in a yellow tinged icy prison. Instead with my next surrealist art project I will move away from using a hedge as my canvas to use either a tall tree or a cliff with ledges on it. The exhibit will be called ‘Defecating from a great height’. I will climb up high, perch on the ledge or branch, and then on a daily basis will defecate from that great height. I may or may not make the ping sound every time I squeeze it out. I’ll improvise on when I use the pings along with my defecation to keep the exhibit fresh and edgy.
Then after about 9 more years I will climb down, of course watching not to step in the huge mound of poo at the bottom, and will then quite probably win the Turner prize.’
