Zumba, 2015 - ongoing
Zumba is a performed painting.
Two performers are instructed to lift up and agitate the works sequinned body under pulsating strobe lights. Through optical trickery, the painting’s heavily laden glittery surface transforms into liquid. Each and every quivering sequin functions as a tiny mirror, bouncing the white light of the strobes rhythmically, into the eyes of the audience. In the folds of the billowing fabric, where light does not reach, shadows are created, while exposed sequins glisten and form highlights, rendering the fabric into a fluid three-dimensional form.
There, not there, there again but different, gives the work a limbo-like status; alternately lit and unlit, Zumba fluctuates between seen and unseen, illusion and reality. Manifesting for mere seconds, it will reappear in the hands on many people, over time, ad infinitum.