Milan Kohout, Mari Novotny-Jones : "Throw Your Values in the Garbage". China, 2005

Chengdu, China; as part of the Open Performance Art Festival, September 2005.
Performance: Milan Kohout, Mari Novotny-Jones
Kohout made this performance in collaboration Mari Novotny-Jones. People were encouraged to choose one of their favorite values from classical Chinese society such as social justice, equality, friendship, cooperation, solidarity, collectivism etc., each of which was written as a word (a Chinese character) on a piece of paper. They were asked to wrap the paper they had chosen around a stone and then try to shoot it into a garbage can from a distance, like a game of basketball.
When they succeeded, they were asked to pick up one of the nice-looking envelopes available as a reward, to be opened up at home. These envelopes contained some of the values which will inevi- tably come into Chinese society with the growth of the capitalist market society, such as individual- ism, loneliness, isolation, ignorance, waste, depression, arrogance, etc.