The Ecstasy of Marcus Whale

I apologise for the corporate room at Southbank and hit record. The atmosphere shifts. Our performance has begun. Upon the floor, during the Ecstasy shows, Marcus Whale places a mirror. The image reflected there, identical to its bodily cousin, is bloodless. The audience sees Whale, dressed in costume. One outfit recalls the sixteenth-century Saint Teresa of Ávila. Another, the bondage gear of Kenneth Anger. Whale observes both his image and the room inside which he stands — and the audience, stationed at ninety-degree angles in a three-sided rectangle, looking at him. It is a kind of rhythm.