Do you know how long it takes, reading for 24 hours a day, to recite each year in strict chronological order from one million BC to one million AD - in effect, two million numbers? Ten weeks. Which is why the South London Gallery's performance piece currently in Trafalgar Square is attempting only 10 per cent of the feat. It's still something of a marathon: from 29 March until 5 April, for 24 hours a day, two people are sitting in a large glass box at the foot of Nelson's Column, reading extracts from the conceptual artist On Kawara's epic book, One Million Years. This 20-volume work starts at 998031 BC and, with a few exceptions, lists every year up to 1001980 AD.
I arrived at Trafalgar Square two hours after the epic performance started. I recognised one of the artists in the glass structure, Joshua Sofaer, whom I had last encountered performing an artwork that involved singing extracts from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat in a south London bedroom. This time, things were more serious: Joshua and his co-reader, Olivia Plender, were taking turns to count down the years, their words amplified by loudspeakers to crowds of utterly mystified tourists.
"982693 BC," said Sofaer. The reading of each number is followed by a pause of a similar length before the next year is read out. I went to inspect the explanatory signboards put up by the South London Gallery, written in five languages. By the time I got back, things had moved on a little. "982689 BC," said Olivia. Pause. "982688 BC," responded Joshua. What had happened in the years recited during the 30 seconds I had been away? Man had invented the axe, probably.
There is a crucial 12-year lacuna. The first ten books go up to 1969, and the next ten start from 1981. Not so much a case of "I Love the 1970s" as "I Forgot About Them Altogether". "Why is there a break? Is it something significant?" demanded Beryl Scott, a printer who had come from Ipswich to see a piece of contemporary art in London and was very pleased to have stumbled across this one right in the centre.
"Er, no, actually," said the spokeswoman from the South London Gallery. "The artist didn't type the years on each page in numerical order. He used a system of cutting and pasting, and he found it tricky to cut and paste those years into the volumes of his book. It was all about the photocopier he was using, or something." Beryl Scott looked astonished. "I know," murmured the spokeswoman. "I'm gutted. My birth year has been missed out."
Leaving aside his wayward photocopying technique, the artist responsible, On Kawara, is what you might call a number fan. He gives his age in days (on the day of writing, 30 March, he is 26,029 days old), and since 29 December 1972 he has entered only the days of the week into his journal (which you might expect to be there anyway, but I guess it depends on what sort of journal it is).
Kawara never talks about his work. So if you want to muse on the year 564985 BC, or wait until 2004 comes up, you will have to hang out in Trafalgar Square, day or night, and make of it what you will. It's non-stop, free and as fresh as the spring weather. At night, Group 4 security has been booked, just in case overexcited hordes of drunken numerologists turn up.
