amy malbeuf performs
photos by catherine kuzik
performance art in public space can be tricky. you never really know how the work will be received - security might be called or the police alerted because any unknown or unusual activity can be deemed ”suspicious.”
often the safest bet for the artist is to act “as if” the authority resides in them, “as if” this activity is completely normal and they are just “doing their job.” and this is exactly what amy malbeuf did. she arrived on the scene, she performed her task, she left. perfectly normal. except, amy malbeuf was dressed in a silver leotard that completely covered her body. her body…and her head. no eyes, no nose, no mouth, no skin, no hair was visible. all we see is a body encased in silver. the task performed involved walking in a circle and spreading some colourful substance with a “golfgreen” fertilizer spreader.
as an unsuspecting audience you could be more charmed than alarmed. this was, after all, a daylight activity performed in a park. the silver being did not seem to pose a threat, and there was no obvious danger either to the silver being or to yourself.
if you had the time and the inclination you would probably sit on the concrete ledge next to the grass and watch. and this is precisely what various “spectators” did. i imagine they would have found pleasure in the confident stride of the being dressed in silver, and perhaps they found pleasure in the sparkly reflective quality of the clothing. the coloured substance coming from the fertilizer spreader was also pleasing to the eye. there was comfort found in the repetition of the action. the sensation was not, i suspect, very different than the pleasure one receives from sitting in a park and watching grass being mown. watching a body engaging fully in a task is one of the small pleasures of life, and here this pleasure is augmented by the beauty of the spectacle unfolding before you.
first a pale blue substance is scattered via a fertilizer spreader in the configuration of a circle. after this circle is complete the silver being pours a darker blue material into the fertilizer spreader. this darker blue is spread on top of the pale blue. i think of matisse as this colour is spread. henri matisse and his paper cutouts, where often a clear blue predominated. however the silver being does not stop here. on top of the blue ground a white substance is spread, and on top of the white substance a golden-brown large seed is spread. “wheat” i hear someone say. the circle is complete, the work done. i watch as the silver being flings a brown sack over the shoulder and, pushing the greengolfer feeder in front, walks down the sidewalk and out of view. i watch the figure walk away until they slip out of sight. i wonder, what was that about?
as a spectator i could leave the performance here and have it rest as a moment in my life where i saw something strange and wonderful. i could also share what i had seen with friends.
lets just say one of my friends who i told the story to was curious and wanted to know more. i could take this friend back to the park and show them the circle as this trace of the action remains. its possible the colours in the circle are scuffed because people have shuffled over the pigment or perhaps some of the seeds are gone, plucked by birds. my friend, curious as to what the carrier of the pigment is, might bend down and take some of the blue stuff into their hands, smell it, taste it. if so, my friend would discover the material was salt.
hmmm… salt. that is interesting. coloured salt on brick. i wonder what that does? my friend (obviously smarter and more resourceful than i am) tells me when salt is given to cows (as cows must have salt in order to survive) the grass around the salt dies. in fact, my friend continues, salt is poisonous and if eaten in too great a quantity causes death. it’s called salt poisoning.
curious. why would someone colour salt and put it in a park and then put seeds on top of this poisonous substance? my friend, (yes the curious one) decides to google. being incredibly talented my friend comes to this page: http://www.visualeyez.org/festival-2011/artists/amy-malbeuf/ where the project is described and the silver being named.
with this additional information the reading of the action in the park shifts. no longer solely a wondrous magical spectacle the action now becomes loaded with a deeper political and social meaning. these are not ordinary circles, they are markers of a sacred space. the salt, which is the carrier of coloured pigment is meant to be destructive, to reflect a destruction felt by one people through the actions of another people. in this case by indigenous peoples and their colonizers.
as i reflect on this deeper significance i start to imagine how a colonial invasion of amy’s silver being might play out. i start to imagine hundreds, no millions of beings covered in silver cloth descending on edmonton and creating sacred circles. sacred circles that, in effect, are poisonous to the earth. personally, i would have to say that’s a pretty good analogy for the effects of colonialism. an encounter that starts off being a pleasurable sensation of seeing a strange and wondrous being then turns into an occupation that overruns the land and ends up poisoning us all. the drive of colonialism was the accumulation of wealth and goods – i.e. capitalism, and as capitalism knows no bounds the destructive impulse behind colonialism is still alive and well
i think here of amy malbeuf’s circles and the empty space inside the circle. perhaps this inner sanctum is protected; perhaps this inner sanctum is the sacred space of hope.
photo by catherine kuzik
