Cyclic, Exhumed | Performance, 2018 (performed under the name Fanaa)
Cyclic is a durational performance expressing sublime and profane modes of devotion. Through this new, collaborative work commissioned by MOCA Tucson, the artists present actions which highlight the value of lives often deemed disposable, or even incomprehensible.
Presented in the uniquely resonant “lung” of Biosphere 2, a site which simultaneously evokes utopian and dystopian possibilities, Ron Athey, Cassils and Fanaa will bring their creative forces and subjectivities together in this performance that continuously unfolds in a triptych of tableaux vivants. Together, they evoke iconography across age-old faiths which mirror the present-day powers that be. Their cyclical modes of performative exploration orbit possibility and its failure.
“Back in utter dark, a light slowly rises on a mound of earth Fanaa has been buried under for nearly an hour. As the sound of a subterranean drone unravels into a Palestinian lullaby by Rim Banna played in reverse, Fanaa is dragged out of the earth by two men, in an act somewhere between an exhumation and a birth. She gathers the earth of her burial into a large sack, struggling to drag it with her, invoking Medea’s action of carrying the soil of her homeland wherever she goes, as well as the guttural corporeality of Ana Mendieta’s Earth Body series.”
- Ginger Shuck Porcella, Curator, Museum of Contemporary Art Tucson
Cyclic is a durational performance expressing sublime and profane modes of devotion. Through this new, collaborative work commissioned by MOCA Tucson, the artists present actions which highlight the value of lives often deemed disposable, or even incomprehensible.
Presented in the uniquely resonant “lung” of Biosphere 2, a site which simultaneously evokes utopian and dystopian possibilities, Ron Athey, Cassils and Fanaa will bring their creative forces and subjectivities together in this performance that continuously unfolds in a triptych of tableaux vivants. Together, they evoke iconography across age-old faiths which mirror the present-day powers that be. Their cyclical modes of performative exploration orbit possibility and its failure.
“Back in utter dark, a light slowly rises on a mound of earth Fanaa has been buried under for nearly an hour. As the sound of a subterranean drone unravels into a Palestinian lullaby by Rim Banna played in reverse, Fanaa is dragged out of the earth by two men, in an act somewhere between an exhumation and a birth. She gathers the earth of her burial into a large sack, struggling to drag it with her, invoking Medea’s action of carrying the soil of her homeland wherever she goes, as well as the guttural corporeality of Ana Mendieta’s Earth Body series.”
- Ginger Shuck Porcella, Curator, Museum of Contemporary Art Tucson