as if it were the last time.

As If It Were The Last Time was the first subtlemob ever created. It was about celebrating the present, about home, belonging and loss. A snapshot of the world around you, a chance to savour the moment, and make new connections with the people and the place surrounding you. This is no requiem, this a celebratory slow dance, a chance to present in the world, and to see it with fresh eyes.

A subtlemob is an invisible flashmob, it integrates with the beauty of the everyday world, so only its participants are aware of it. It’s like walking through a film. It is experienced on headphones, and it is performed by you and hundreds of strangers. Armed with only an mp3 player it takes you on a cinematic experience of twists and turns. A mixture of narrative and richly textured music fills your ears. Different MP3 files are distributed to different audience groups, so while some perform simple actions, the others hear stories about these actions, so that everywhere they look the stories come alive in the world around them. The roles swap back and forth, sometimes you’ll just be watching, sometimes you’ll be following instructions. There’s nothing embarrassing or dangerous, you’re almost just playing yourself. There is no venue, there are no ushers, this is a performance organised and owned by its audience . . . try to remain invisible


Presented by :

Sonic Acts (Amsterdam), Microwave (Hong Kong), Media City (Seoul), Gameplay (New York), Indiecade (Los Angeles), Performance Space (Sydney), Tristram Bates (London), TPAM (Tokyo), Yokohama Triennial (Yokohama ), ArteMov (Sao Paulo), Forest Fringe (Edinburgh), 1912 (Nanjing), Tiandi (Chongching), Wellington Internatinal Festival (Wellington), SemiPermanent (Auckland), plus independent events in Liverpool, London and Birmingham

   
‘A deliberate slap in the face to the flashmob phenomena . . . it reshapes the cultural landscape.’
– Paul Currion

Writing and composition: Sarah Anderson, Duncan Speakman

Voices : Jess Marlowe, Jess Hoffman

Additional musicians : Leo Smee , Laura Groves

Developed with : Gemma Paintin, James Stenhouse, Uninvited Guests, Ed Rapley, Lucy Cassidy, Alex Bradley, Sita Calvert Ennals, Becky Hall, Tom Wainwright

Developed at Pervasive Media Studio, Bristol