Haircut

Haircut

This performance occurred in room 412 of the Fuller Music Building at the University of Hartford at 5:00 AM on December 18th, 2009. The location, set-up, and performance rituals were based around those commonly employed in concert music. The audience was seated in front of a stage, the performers entered and exited to applause, and bowed before and after the performance.
The performance itself consisted of me cutting approximately 18 inches from the bottom of Daniel Mumbauer's hair with kitchen scissors. The entire event lasted about 10 minutes. The dullness of the scissors and my lack of knowledge of haircutting technique made the process long and somewhat painful - I was constantly pulling his hair to create tension, and by the end my hands had seized up from squeezing the scissors.
Daniel agreed to the haircut under the influence of large amounts of alcohol. Though he has talked about cutting his hair before, he has never made the decision to go through with it, and would unlikely have done so if sober. The decision to cut his hair in this way is in direct contrast to the standard model for a haircut, which usually includes a location equipped to cut hair, a trained hairdresser, no audience, and a person who fully wants his hair to be cut. In this case we were also present in a building that was closed, and in a room that we entered without permission.