Making Connections

I have been spending a lot of time working on my documentary, "The House That Freedom Built" and looking at these historical images of hucksters and market women. Some of the women who lived in my house were hucksters and were able to purchase their freedom with the money they made as an itinerant seller. Looking at these images made me think about the relationship between these women and their surroundings, their bodies as landscape, their relationship to the buildings. It made me think a little of Carrie Mae Weems "Roaming" series where she questions the edifice of power. I saw some similarities with my video work "Somebody's Been Sitting In My Chair, Somebody's Been Sleeping in My Bed" (2011) and a work that I have never shown "I Have a Dream" (2005). I haven't shown this work because I wasn't sure of the direction to go. I knew I was interested in inserting my body in these real estate magazine "dreamscapes", but after I did the first one, I wasn't sure if I should be washing clothes in the pool or lounging at the poolside. For where I am in my life right now this would be a really interesting series to revisit and complete.

Artist Talk

Our Artist Talk for our exhibit "The Great House: A Re-Imagining of Power, Space & History" took place on Saturday, April 16th from 3-5pm. Monica and I discussed our work, the impetus for the project and showed a video from the performance that occurred opening night.

It was an overwhelming experience. I have never been to an artist talk where people cried. It fulfilled every dream and more. A sincere, heartfelt and open discussion about art, life, history and how the pieces impacted the viewer and the community. We were asked to please continue the exhibition for longer. So it's still up, probably until the summer. Check it out if you haven't already. I am still working on posting some audio from the talk. Forthcoming. Promise.

Standard Issue, 2009

Estado de Excepción, or State of Exception, is a series of nine collective exhibitions by the participating artists of the program Catedra de Arte de Conducta. This program was founded by artist Tania Bruguera in 2003 with the purpose of creating an alternative training space to investigate the limits of art and its relationship between life.  

I participated on Monday, March 30 during the exhibition entitled “Advance Party”. The general theme for this show were works that engaged with the realm of children as a way to dialogue about collective memory, historical conditions and ideology.

My piece was a performance in which I dress my 11 month old daughter in the pioneer uniform and let her navigate the gallery space doing her usually activities: crawling, playing, etc... Entitled “Standard Issue” , the piece explores how the individual expresses oneself within a one-size-fits-all ideology.