A Performance Lecture

Part I  

The presentation of an ongoing photographic archive and research of a current year-long performance  project that began in January 2021.  

I am performing for one person or one audience member, once per week, for one year. 

I meet an audience member outside their home and perform either right outside or somewhere nearby within  walking distance. 

I wear special clothing. I wear slick, shiny, black synthetic pants. The shirt it chosen specific to the person and the  weather. I wear socks and tennis shoes. Beforehand, I make sure my toenails are painted. 

We are in safe physical practice together for our health and prevention. 

Each time, I bring colored chalk, a metal dog bowl, and a music player. I also bring other objects unique to each  one-on-one that I choose immediately before going to the performance. 

Before the performance begins, I give the person a disposable camera. I tell them that these photographs serve as  an archive for our performance. It does not need to be of me, and it can be anything they wish to capture from our  time. However, I tell them that their experience is primary, and that taking photos is second and to try to limit it to  around five photos. 

I let the audience member know that we can talk at any time and that I will be very clear about the beginning and  the ending. 

I first started performing one-on-ones in 2013 in Chicago in the home. I eventually moved outside,  meeting people at cafes, parks, and empty school playgrounds. I’ve shifted back and forth from making work for  larger groups to again returning to one-on-ones. Near the end of 2019, deep within sheltering-in-place, social  distancing, and the halt of group events and performance gathering, I came back to one-on-ones outside.  

The project is revealing the complexities of intimacy, consent, and agency. Within operations of chance,  determined parameters, and the openness of improvisation, are questions about authorship, participation, and  environmental phenomena. There are also many negotiations around safety and permission. 

As the work evolves one performance to the next, one audience member at a time, I feel my sensitivity  flex within each interaction. There are these portals of perception within and between everything that vary in  qualities. Different types of constriction or openness, friction and tension of our attention. The very togetherness  of these live performances is jostling awake some poetic and unpredictable experience that is over all too quickly.  

Reoccurring images and objects are anchors. The chalk marking the ground where my body lays, the  smooth colors of paint across my skin, the slick, black pants making odd sounds with every move of my legs. The  small slip of paper with the words “sexuality is an expression of it’s safe to be you.” 

Part II  

A reading of open letters to audience members who have participated in this project thus far.    

Part III  

Guided observation for lecture attendees to engage in an act of witnessing for themselves.