PERFORMANCE / ACTION

Performance is a catch all term. I mean there are many different sorts of performance. Some require an audience, some use the audience as part of the art, while some have no audience present to view the performance at all. Some are better described as actions. Others might better be called interventions. They can be highly political and/or spiritual.

Ladybug Release

On March 21, Spring Equinox, I climbed to the grassy summit of Buena Vista Park(in the Upper Haight of San Francisco) and actualized this piece.

I sat and sewed the bottoms of my pants and shirt into pockets, which encircled my body.

I put on the clothes.

I filled the new pockets with vast quantities of live ladybugs.

With my arms raised, I stood in the sun allowing the ladybugs to climb to the summit of my fingertips and fly.

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​Burial in the Void

I was invited to do a piece in a group show at Baker Beach.

I dug a pit.

I planted driftwood stakes around its perimeter.

I laid stepping stones of ice going from the ocean to my pit. The ice was spaced using the golden ratio with my pit being zero.

An assistant buried me. I breathed through a pipe.

I remained buried until the ice melted.

​Subjective Frame

For seventy-two hours straight, I carried a large gold frame with me. During that time, I considered everything I percieved as art. Everything I experienced, physically, mentally and emotionally was part of the piece. Otherwise, I did nothing out of the ordinary.

The frame was like a string tied around my finger reminding me that reality is art.

From this, the concept of 'Art-Time' emerged. This is when you frame a section of time as art rather than a section of space. I later learned of artist Marty Pottenger who coined the term.

Weed

I noticed that weeds would grow through cracks in the concrete overnight. I wondered if I could SEE a weed grow. My intention was to sit for twenty-four hours straight watching a weed, and never take my eyes off it...I wanted to see it grow. I fasted for two days prior and drank minimally so as to avoid the need to use a bathroom. The day came...and it was pouring rain. Just prior to my sitting down to watch, someone must have stepped on the weed. Parts of it were crushed.

I sat down at 1:00pm

During the time I watched, I saw parts wither and die as other less damaged stems recieved the extra energy and inflated.
​The center grew a tiny new leaf.

It was very cold. As the night wore on, I began to freely hallucinate. This was due to the hunger, coldness and sleep deprivation. I felt I was seeing the weed in a real way. I felt a connection with it. I felt it was my teacher.

It was the coldest night of the recorded year. In the late morning, I collapsed. The piece was finished.

​Gun

As the turn of the millienium approached, I worried that it would bring harmful choas. This piece occured on New Years Eve of 1999.

I made my way to a volcano.

I climbed the volcano.

The last time this volcano erupted...it left the top flat. I searched for and found the center.

I sat in the center. I visualized the core of the earth far below me. I visualized the channel between us. I visualized energy in the form of 'order', erupting up from the core, up the channel, up through me and flowing out in all directions to surround the earth.

As I sat, I felt midnight approaching like a wave, from the otherside of the globe...moving across the surface of the earth.

​Balance

I was invited to do a piece in a group show. I molded an arrow from ice and a target of fire. Many neighbors watched through cracked blinds.

The target before it was lite.

Aiming at my goal.

​Looking for Jose'

In May of 2001, Jose' Rodriguez was asked to leave our art school due to his contriversial art work. He was a fellow art student with me, although I barely knew him. I felt that this censorship was wrong. So I did this piece.

On May 14, as I sat in our class, which Jose' was conspicously absent from (due to his exile)...I began my piece. I stood up and yelled to the class, "Has anyone seen Jose'?" I walked out of the class and stuck my head into the next class and yelled, "I am looking for Jose' Rodriguez!...Has anyone seen Jose'?" I continued from class to class, asking every class. I circulated through the entire school, every gallery, the cafateria, the deans office and all the other offices. I searched the entire school for Jose' asking everyone I passed...until I made a full cuircit back to my original class. The piece was over.