Snail Ballet? That's Gonna Be An Escar-No For Me, Dog.

The Guardian – Only minutes after meeting Elizabeth Saint-Jalmes and Cyril Leclerc at their Paris apartment, I’m invited into their darkened boudoir. Several snails are crawling on the floor next to the bed. Each has a little light-emitting diode attached to its shell that activates sensors on a nearby speaker designed by Elizabeth that is pumping out soothingly drone-like music composed by Cyril.

What I’m witnessing is a teaser for a six-hour, 176-snail ballet called Slow Pixel that the two artists are bringing to London later this month for its UK premiere as part of Cryptic’s Sonica festival. For only £4.50, you can watch illuminated snails crawl around a darkened room to challenging music. Don’t tell me you’re not tempted.

“These snails were raised to be eaten,” Elizabeth whispers. It’s striking how all three of us change our behaviour in this chambre des escargots – we speak more quietly, walk gingerly around the room (none of us want to hear the crunch of calcium carbonate shell) and find ourselves kneeling to get a closer view. We, as much as the snails, are performers in this ballet.

I know it’s 4/20 and people like to do weird shit but this article is in no way written to be funny. This is real shit going on in London guys. These two wackos are putting on a 6+ hour snail ballet featuring live music (I think) and a bunch of snails with little lights on their backs leaving snail-trails on walls to illustrate city lights. That’s just a statement of fact. What the hell is going on here!!!

I’m yelling now. Actually, I calmed down using various breathing exercises. It’s Friday, I’ve got nothing to be upset about. Let’s talk about this.

I’m not a numbers guy so I’m not gonna dive into $$ conversions or anything like that, but how much would you pay to see this show? $15? They said people are leaving after a few minutes; others stay the whole time. To me, it just sounds like a weird art gallery for people who want something to look at as they come down from an acid trip. For $15, with the right friends, that could be the end to a solid night.

But if you’re going to something like this without being on some pretty serious drugs, you my friend, well you’re just weird. This stuff is weird! Snails are little gastropods that crawl around and live under rocks. We eat them with butter and garlic and then you dip the bread in the melted garlic butter and it’s good too.

I don’t hate snails, I just think it’s weird that anyone would ever create a ballet/art show featuring dozens of snails. That’s not to say that if someone had maybe 1 single snail and marketed it as some remarkable snail, I wouldn’t be interested in seeing it. It’s more about the magnitude of this show and the way these people are talking about it that has me shook. Thank you for your time.

#Happy420