michelle.kasprzak.ca
Performance Projects: Message in a Bottle Express Service
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Images


Project Description:

Kasprzak Service Industries presents:
The latest in our suite of Communication Redirection Services:
Message in a Bottle Express Service

Procedure:
  1. Pick up one of our message cards at depots in downtown Toronto (available April 20 - May 31, 2002, at the CONTACT Festival and the Images Festival, Toronto) or request one by sending your mail address to michelle@kasprzak.ca
  2. Enter your message in the blanks provided.
  3. Affix sufficient postage and deposit in any post box.
  4. Check http://michelle.kasprzak.ca for photographs, GPS data, and other evidence of the dispatch of your message.

Kasprzak Service Industries will ensure that your message is dispatched to the Ocean from the coastal areas of North America. Please enter any message that you wish, but keep in mind that we cannot guarantee the date of receipt, identity of the recipient, security of your message data, or a timely response.

Message in a Bottle Express Service is a conceptual performance project by Michelle Kasprzak. The act of casting a message in a bottle into the ocean is romantic and somewhat old-fashioned. This system is the antithesis of contemporary communication methods, which are efficient and reliable. In an age of instant messaging, texting and e-mail, who would do something so idle as throwing their message in the ocean, hoping it will turn up somewhere?

Recognizing that most people don't have the time or energy to engage in this type of whimsical activity, Kasprzak presents herself as a service bureau that will create the message card, receive your message, put it into a bottle, and then cast that bottle into the ocean.

Offering no guarantees, the service presents itself as a forum for contemplation of uncertainty within all modes of communication. This uncertainty, however, is tempered by the constant presence of a remote hope that someone is on the other end. The professionalism and personal care that Kasprzak offers with this service ensures the best possible send-off for our thought fragments, prayers, rants, and ramblings.

Message in a Bottle Express Service was divided into three phases: Message Collection, Message Distribution, and Message Archiving. The Message Collection phase involved the production and distribution of a postcard that explained the project and provided blanks for the participant's message. (Toronto, ON/global: April 10 - June 10, 2002.) The Message Distribution phase was the point where the artist bottled the messages she had received and released them into the ocean. (Halifax, NS: June 12 - 16.) The Message Archiving phase involved the documentation of the messages, and of each message's release into the ocean, which is available for view here. (on the internet: June 30 - onward.)

Thank you for your patronage.

Past Presentations:
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