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There is a safety procedure for most disasters. Locate the nearest exit. Avoid exterior windows. Your seat cushion can be used as a flotation device. Pop quiz: What do you do when the ground beneath your feet suddenly gives way? Procedures for Ground Loss Safety, the fifth installment of the “Take It to the Bridge” series at the Corcoran, will tell you what to do.
Or, maybe it won’t. Dancer Sarah Levitt, who will perform 30-minute loops between noon and 5 P.M. on Saturday, is modeling the performance after “Duck and Cover,” the Cold War films that instructed school children to get below their desks and cover their necks to protect them from the blast and radiation. Levitt freely admits that her looping performance, which will change throughout the day, possess the same futility. However, it also is performative metaphor for the sociopolitical positions we take through life, which have to adapt when new information challenges those positions, effectively pulling the ground out from beneath our feet. Who knew Ayn Rand was the second coming of Jesus Christ? Touch the doorknob to feel if it is hot. Proceed to a safe location in an orderly fashion.
Take it to the Bridge runs to Sept. 15 at the Corcoran Gallery of Art.