On 29 November 2008 , McGowan performed '' The Reenactment Of The Assassination of Jean-Charles de Menezes '' , an ode to an innocent Brazilian national shot dead by the Metropolitan Police outside Stockwell Underground station in London the year previously , less that a fortnight before the verdict on the death was due to be released . McGowan told '' This Is London '' : " I am not doing this to raise my own profile . I think there is a real sense of apathy about what happened to this innocent man . People need to take note of what is happening here , rather than thinking about who is going to win '' X Factor '' and what they are getting for Christmas . Hopefully this performance will do this . " For this performance , McGowan played down by the entrance surrounded by press , with a box over his head with a picture of de Menezes and covered in ketchup as fake blood . An accomplice pretended to be a police officer with a large fake gun ; conveniently police sirens blared down the street at the same time . One of the " box head people " was a regular contributor to conspiracy theorist David Icke 's website forums , who described McGowan as his " tutor " . The '' Londonist '' reported : " It could be seen as a rather confused and distasteful attempt to treat the public ’s post-traumatic stress disorder , forcing the public to confront the event one more time to gain some kind of control over the event itself and our reactions to it . It could be seen as live protest art , an expression of dismay and discontent at the current inquest . " For this piece of protest performance art entitled '' Ballerina Pig 2009 '' on Saturday 14 June 2009 , McGowan danced around outside Scotland Yard ( the headquarters of London 's Metropolitan Police force ) for ten minutes whilst dressed as a pink ballerina and wearing a pig snout over his face , before being threatened with arrest and moved on by police officers . McGowan claimed it was a protest in response to new laws being brought in to stop police being photographed or video recorded by the public whilst the police are on the job , because there should be transparency in public service and the laws may stop police misconduct being recorded . McGowan explained : " The law is outrageous and should be reversed immediately , and I will be looking to have my photograph taken with as many police men and women that I can find . " In September 2010 , McGowan used the opportunity of a National Lottery-funded and Arts Council-funded stage show to create '' The Re-enactment of the Assassination of Raoul Moat . '' This was conceived by McGowan to commemorate the life and crimes of Newcastle upon Tyne-born murderer Raoul Moat , only 11 weeks after Moat had left prison , injured his ex-girlfriend , shot dead her new lover , and blinded a policeman , all the while taunting Northumbria Police whom he blamed for his predicament and sparking one of the biggest manhunts in British history . Moat shot and killed himself in the picturesque riverside village of Rothbury after a six-hour stand-off with armed police . Explaining the play , McGowan said : " Raoul Moat was a very jealous man and some people did sympathize with him . He became an anti-hero . I thought what happened was really tragic . He was a very sad figure in the end . People let him down . His rage was born out of his girlfriend ’s infidelity and he found it difficult to cope with . He was a victim . The play has not been created to shock and upset . This is just an interpretation of the story , everyone has to take an angle . There were no winners in the case of Raoul Moat . " The play was supported by some including Moat 's family . Raoul 's brother Angus Moat said : " I was aware that Mark McGowan was planning some form of performance art about the events surrounding my brother . Anything which provokes debate , thought and reason about the tragic events of last summer rather than instinctive knee-jerk positive or negative reactions has my support if that is Mark McGowan ’s sincere intention . " The play saw McGowan wearing a mask of Moat who claimed he had for years being a victim of police brutality and police harassment which has cost him his business , his family and his freedom ; McGowan also played other roles such as a newsreader and the blinded PC David Rathband . Despite being slammed by victim support groups ( especially Victim Support ) and also David Rathband , who suggested that McGowan should " let the dust settle " and await the findings of the inquest , the show played out to a packed-out London gallery and a packed-out gallery in Newcastle and both times were critically supported well . McGowan said to the '' Sunday Sun '' : " I always worry about impact . I ’m sensitive about people affected by stories . It went really well . I talked people through what it would be like to have their partner with someone else . I got a very strong positive reaction and I could n’t get away after the show because everyone wanted to talk to me . I got the audience to imagine they were Raoul and they were experiencing rage . Of course I then explained it would be inappropriate behavior to shoot someone and I got a lot of laughs . " At the time there was wide controversy in the tabloids about a large number of Facebook pages being set up calling Moat a " legend " and " hero " , many of which were taken down , and legal threats were made over them . This issue along with Mark McGowan 's stage play '' The Re-enactment of the Assassination of Raoul Moat '' were discussed on British national talk show '' The Wright Stuff '' under the topic " waste of cash ? " ; the host claimed that he " hates the Facebook culture promoting Moat as a hero " and McGowan was described as the most " self-promoting , publicity-seeking sicko out there . " McGowan later apologised in '' The Londonist '' for any distress that may have caused by '' The Re-enactment of the Assassination of Raoul Moat '' , but still defended it to the BBC , saying " Moat was a bad man , he killed people . That 's inappropriate , more than inappropriate , you ca n't go round expressing anger in that way , it 's just wrong . There 's no way in the world that I 'd want to hurt anyone , but being an artist , that 's always difficult . Being a witness to your times is very challenging , it 's difficult not to affect people if you are doing your job . One of the things that people have a problem with is art as a form of representation of a contemporary issue . The role of art is to challenge . " " This piece is intentionally provocative and is a comment on the representation of images from the war in Iraq . The girls are aged between 16 and 19 years old , they will be naked except for green hoods placed over their heads and is potentially very disturbing . We receive images and reports from Iraq on a daily basis , how they are delivered and represented within the media are I believe biased , doctored and misrepresented . When a soldier from the West dies we have nice clean images of the family sitting at home in front of a library back lit with a picture of their dead family member ; it 's tragic . Any death of an Iraqi is accompanied by a bunch of wailing , screaming mothers fathers uncles grandmothers . It 's to suggest that we are all sane and they are all mad , and it 's not fair . The film '' Three Kings '' with George Clooney , Mark Walberg and Ice Cube , where the three American soldiers steal all the gold but liberate the Iraqi people is still regularly shown on Sky television and terrestrial television ; people in Wyoming , Coventry and Rome watch this film in their homes and believe it is a reality . This is really wrong . " In protest of what he perceived to be ever-increasing totalitarianism in the United States such as the Patriot Act , and also the War on Terror , and in support of human rights , in early 2007 McGowan traveled to New York City to perform '' Kick George Bush In The Ass '' . In late February , McGowan crawled around the streets of Manhattan for 72 hours , and covering 36 miles in total , whilst dressed up as and wearing a mask of US President George W. Bush and a " Kick My Ass " sign on his back . " George Bush is mental , " he says . " His global policies are terrible . I want people to get some satisfaction when they kick Bush . " The event was covered by Reuters international news agency . McGowan told Reuters : " My work is no publicity stunt but definitely an art form . A lot of the things I do are a bit silly but they always have a political edge to them . " In a mostly critical article in British newspaper '' The Guardian '' , which described the stunt as " juvenile " , McGowan stated : " It 's a kind of therapeutic engagement . Hopefully people will be able to come and kick me ( the President , George Bush ) as hard as they like , and gain some comfort in the fact that they can say I kicked George in the ass . " The response from New Yorkers was positive
one of the biggest manhunts in British history
2010 Northumbria Police manhunt
Mark McGowan (performance artist)