Between a Stone and a Shrine, 2014
HD video, 11:00:00, 7 channel video installation
An allegorical story about a gilded casket filled with sunflower seeds arriving to Braddock, PA, a post-industrial town. The video performance walks between levity and weight, real and fictional, performed and actual labor. Actions including the gilding of the casket by the Braddock Youth Project, the repetitive work of preparing soil, grave digging, demolition, and the lifting and procession of the casket filled with 200 lbs of sunflower seeds. The casket was led in a procession to its final resting place in an abandoned lot, sunflowers were planted as a symbol of regeneration.and the eventual burial culminate to the labor required to cultivate a seed or the labor that is required to leave a legacy of regeneration and collective action.
The story is presented as a 7 channel synchronized video installation to immerse the viewer in a dizzying choreography of switching screens. This fragmented viewing refers to the fragmentation that occurs during insensitive redevelopment.
Presented at Lossless, 2014 MFA Thesis Exhibition, Miller Gallery, Carnegie Mellon University.
