The borders of performance are crossing with such spheres of culture as theatre, music, dance, philosophy and religion. Sometimes it is hard to say where performance ends and theatre starts, where musical performance transforms into concert, where the setting of the environment is already installation. As Artis Gulbis has been a participant of Ansis Rūtentāls movement theatre for a long time, his performances come from theatre. He likes to use sound, light and movement, - elements used both in visual art and in theatre. Therefore the major part of Artis Gulbis performances can be called movement improvisations. The main idea, aim and fulfillment of them is movement as itself. These are processes during which he is concentrated on movement, getting satisfaction from every move. Depending from idea of every performance, he is using different materials: paper, canvas, string, water, fire. Together with Dzintars Krūmiņš he improvised at the opening of the exhibition Papersea in 1999, where the main means of expression was paper. In the center of the gallery was placed a pile of papers under which man was moving. As it was not possible to see him, there was an image created, that paper was alive and that it was moving and doing his own things. The second character, who was wrapped up in the paper from head to toe, was communicating with the alive paper pile: coming closer, touching, taking out strips of paper from pile.

The artist himself is not trying to give a name to his action. Starting from the year 2001 Artis Gulbis has made several actions named Skin , during which he is wrapping up a man from head to toe into felt of different color. Actions are taking place in different environments: the green area of the city, indoors, in the open air. Depending from the environment, visual and emotional, impressions differ. The aim of his performances is not the result, but the process itself and also the series of movements made by the man who is wrapping-up and by the man who is wrapped up.