What If? In the Days When the Tiger Smoked
collaboration with Torsten Zenas Burns
traveling and changing exhibition of videos, prints, sculptural relief prints, & photo cut-outs
The exhibition included a 35 minute video, What If? In the Days When the Tiger Smoked, the extended conglomerate edit of What If? Beyond a CarnaLove and What If? Images below are of the exhibition installations and photo stand-ins.
What-If? In the Days When the Tiger Smoked was the culmination of an ongoing project, which began in Busan, South Korea. At the heart of the work is the unfolding of a role-playing workshop where participants reenact dates leading up to a fictional polyamorous romance. The performance, played by a rotating international cast of artists, leads to a group wedding and honeymoon between characters based upon two obscure Marvel superheroes and two internationally renowned art personalities. The happy foursome are Orlan, an artist whose actual redefinition of her own image confronts representations of woman throughout art history; Stelarc, an artist whose cybernetic mission in life is to render the body obsolete; the Scarlet Witch, a mutant superhero who has unlimited powers over probability, and the Vision, a “synthezoid” superhero whose mechanically fabricated body contains a human soul. What If? unfolds the entangled story that brought this romantic foursome together spanning the gulf between genders and representations; the body and technology. In the Days When the Tiger Smoked is a Korean saying for “Once Upon a Time.” Photo stand-ins based on the characters of What If? extend the act of role-playing towards an invitation to a participating audience.
Krowswork Gallery, Oakland, CA
Taber Gallery, Holyoke, MA
I.V.A.N. (Augmenting-Capturing cluster)
Dumbo Arts Center, Brooklyn, NY
Photo stands: Foursome Clusteroid and I.V.A.N. (Augmenting-Capturing cluster)