![An image from Mike Parr’s Asylum [Entry by Mirror Only] from Dark Mofo, 2016](https://media.guim.co.uk/b87db13dd0ec81370f6ef0b39b34c0c0f92d5e77/141_220_1907_1145/1000.jpg)
The artist Mike Parr will be buried underneath a road for three days as part of a new performance work at this year’s Dark Mofo festival in Hobart.
Parr will be buried below the bitumen in the central lane of Macquarie Street, which passes through the Hobart city centre, in a container measuring 4.5 metres by 1.7 metres by 2.2 metres, and the road will be resealed once the container is in place for traffic to continue as normal over the site.
The work, entitled Underneath the Bitumen the Artist, is intended to be a comment on the violence of Australia’s colonial history. It will begin at 9pm on Thursday 14 June when the container is buried, and close at 9pm on Sunday 17 June, when Parr will make his exit.
“When Mike Parr asks to be buried under the streets of Hobart, it’s hard to say no,” the Dark Mofo creative director, Leigh Carmichael, said in a statement.
“Underneath the Bitumen the Artist acknowledges two deeply linked events in Tasmania’s history. The eventual transportation of 75,000 British and Irish convicts in the first half of the 19th century, and the subsequent, nearly total destruction of Tasmania’s Aboriginal population.”
Dark Mofo said Parr would be provided with sketchbooks, pencils, a stool, bedding, water, “and other items necessary for survival”. He will continue to create artworks while underground and out of sight.
The container will remain in the road after the performance has concluded and will be sealed with concrete.
Parr’s artworks are known for being challenging and often disturbing, and regularly contain an endurance element – from the audience as well as the artist. This is the third time he has created an artwork for the Tasmanian arts festival. Asylum [Entry by Mirror Only] – a 72-hour endurance piece in Willow Court Asylum – took place in 2016, and last year had Empty Ocean.
Dark Mofo will run in Hobart from 13 to 24 June, with a prelude weekend of programming beginning on 7 June.
