Martin O'Brien & Sheree Rose: Greatest Hits

As the world falls apart, in a night club in London, two zombie rock stars attempt to keep on going. Sickly and falling apart, their bodies remember the decadence of the past and try to continue what they used to do. Part lecture-demonstration/part attempt to roll back the years, ‘The Greatest Hits’ is a performance that reenacts moments from the work Rose and O’Brien have done together. It marks 15 years of collaboration between them and is a special celebration of Rose’s 85^th birthday. Featuring special guest appearances from other artists, ‘The Greatest Hits’ will be a tongue in cheek and poignant exploration of friendship, aging, memory, and loss. It is a tribute to history and a dedication to continuing. Come and celebrate the 85^th birthday of one of performance arts biggest icons, at Iklectik.

Sheree Rose is a pioneering body artist and subcultural icon of the Los Angeles BDSM scene. She has been thrilling, shocking, and exciting audiences around the world, beginning with her collaborative photography and performances with Bob Flanagan in 1981. Their groundbreaking show, “Visiting Hours” opened at the Santa Monica Museum of Art in 1994, and travelled to the New Museum of Contemporary Art in New York City. She collaborated with Mike Kelley on the video “One Hundred Reasons”, as well as music videos with Nine Inch Nails (Happiness in Slavery), Danzig (It’s Coming Down) and Godflesh (Crush My Soul). She co-produced the Sundance award winning documentary film, Sick. Since 2011, she has collaborated with British performance artist, Martin O’Brien, in performances in England, New York and Los Angeles, including “Dust to Dust” at One Institute, “The Viewing” at DaDa Fest in Liverpool, England, and “The Assension” at Jason Vass Gallery, Los Angeles. In 2020, the book ‘Rated RX: Sheree Rose with and after Bob Flanagan’ was published, documenting 40 years of performance work.

Martin O’Brien is an artist and zombie. He works across performance, writing and video art. His work uses long durational actions, short speculative texts and critical rants, and performance processes to explore death and dying, what it means to be born with a life shortening disease, and the philosophical implications of living longer than expected. He has shown work throughout the UK; Europe; USA; and Canada and is well known for his solo performances and collaborations with the legendary LA artist and dominatrix Sheree Rose. His most recent works were at Wellcome Collection in 2026, Tate Britain in 2025, The Southbank Centre in 2024, the ICA (London) in 2021, and as Writer in Residence at Whitechapel Gallery in 2023. He is winner of the Philip Leverhulme Prize for Visual and Performing Arts 2022. Martin has cystic fibrosis and all of his work and writing draws upon this experience. In 2018, the book ‘Survival of the Sickest: The Art of Martin O’Brien’ was published by Live Art Development Agency. His work has been featured on BBC radio and Sky Arts television, and as a double page spread in The Guardian. He is Reader in Live Art at Queen Mary University of London.