Signed, Sealed…
November 9th, 2009
…Delivered!
For her Performa 2009 project, SVA alumna Lisa Kirk led bands of smiling demonstrators throughout the LES, all bearing homemade picket signs crafted from Lisa’s instructions. That is, some assembly required – pun intended.
About 30 men, women, and children congregated for the perambulatory culmination in Seward Park.
For “Demonstration,” participants responding to an open call were invited to complete the statement “I AM…” and send their ideas to Invisible-Exports. All are absurd, most are a hoot, some are reassuring, a few are eww-creepy, and the rest are so meta.
Though Lisa was the creative impetus of the project, the “protestors” deserve applause for inventing, printing, and crafting the signs all by themselves.
It was a hit! The game of comparing signs – “you show me yours and I’ll show you mine” – provided inexhaustible comedy.
Double the fun when signifier and signified flip out in the recontextualizing oils of a child’s hand!
Double, double your fun when when Chinese children playing in the park seized the signs. Diplomatic efforts from both sides ensured a happy alliance.
The unwitting audiences were surprised, amused, and stumped; and their responses were immediate, candid, and no less a personal declaration of identity and autonomy.
