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"A bit of Gossip, A bit of Privacy"

Artist: Sheena Rose Filmed by Amery Butcher My story I wish to share with you...enjoy Performers : EmpressZingha Griffith, Deevon Clinton and Shanice Wharton Assistant : Rhea Bell

Location: Rose’s home

Thank you all!

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A bit of Gossip, A bit of Privacy Process part 1

How did this performance happen? Long story...

Since pursuing my MFA in studio art at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, I realized my first set of work was very dark and depressing. Honestly, I was embarrassed to show this side of me. I did not want people to feel sorry for me and the work strongly showed self hate, remembering the past experience that make me felt very sad.

One evening, I decided to put myself inside the box, I asked myself what will happen, if I did put myself in the box? Would I faced my fears? Would I understand myself more? I was scared of being uncomfortable but the professors told me, being uncomfortable is absolutely a great process and development of the work. So I continued to be in the box and I discovered so much about myself, I learned more about being a black Caribbean woman, sexual relationships, colonization and the history and culture of Barbados. I also asked myself many time, “Why and what makes me so different?” “Why am I so interested in stereotypes of persons’ cultures and countries?”

After putting myself inside the box, I started to feel more confident and felt like a new and better person.

In the next semester, I created a performance piece called “This Strange Land...” At that time I felt so alienated and very distance from home. I asked myself “why do I feel like an alien, a strange awkward creature ? Especially being so far away from home for such a long time?” I had to create this performance for myself to understand this feeling and I transformed my studio into a paradise, a exaggeration of “ home”. Persons who attended the performance, peeked through binoculars with coconut trees stuck on them and the viewers felt like if they discovered a paradise. However, the costume I wore, felt like a ghost of colonizations of this strange land to the viewers.

After the performance and received great reviews, I realized I needed to include other persons into other performances. I wondered, how would it feel to direct persons instead of using myself in the work. I knew this will be somewhat a challenge for me because I always used myself in most or all of my work.

During the summer vacation, I stayed by my aunt Annette in New York City and brainstormed on what will I create next especially for studio art. I reminded myself , “Hey, you are in New York City, enjoyed it! So I networked like crazy, spoke to curators, directors and artists. I had an artist’s talk at MoCADA with Amarylise DeJeus Moleski artist and Isissa Komada-John curator. I hang out with Barbados Community College students during their visit. I visited the garden, the zoo, galleries and museums, the National Museum of Nature and History and also attended Naomi Jackson’s book launch. I was inspired and super excited to be in New York. It was definitely the place that never sleep and my mind was not sleeping at all either. I was still brainstorming on what will be my next big project? Funny enough, during my free time, I kept on working on sketches but the pieces were very dark and creepy looking again. I asked myself...”why do I hate myself sometimes?” why is it that when ever I create a self portrait, I tend to cover the face with heaviness of paint? I questioned this so many times.

In June, I visited the Venice Biennial with my Univerisity for art history and it was amazing!!! I really enjoyed Okwui Enwenzor’s vision in the Arsenale. What was truly amazing, I saw him at the biennial and he remembered me! I was so happy! in 2010, we met in Barbados, Okwui Enwezor did a presentation at NAGC conference and I asked him, if he could see my work. I showed him, my work and he really liked it and I flipped! I told him excitedly, I wanted to be “a big up artist, a star!” He stopped me in my excitement and told me, “Hold on, try and get your masters, see if you can get better in your work. Don’t think to get big, think to get good,” From there, that quote stay with me forever, and it is true, I always think to get better each time in my work.

When I saw Okwui, I told him, I have been awarded the Fulbright scholarship, great things are happening and I am still going very strongly with my art. Congrats to you and this fantastic Venice Biennial. We both smiled and took a selfie. ( smiling and laughing)

It was so surreal to be at the Venice Biennial, I was especially blown away by the work in the Arsenale. Some of the work in the pavilions in the Gardini and parts of the city were fun to find and breathe taking. However some work were disappointing and I asked rudely “Wait! How they get in the biennial???”. There were some works that stuck with me and i can see how they can greatly influence my work, such as the Greece’s pavilion, Thailand’s Pavilion and Tania Brugera’s a Cuban artist’s performance. I felt in love these work and imagine myself creating my own performance when I return to Barbados. Besides the art work in Venice, the city itself was gorgeous.Again, It was so surreal to me to be there where the beginning of the first biennial started. I was truly happy that I attended the Venice Biennial, Thank you Dr. Lawrence Jenkins, Mariam Stephan for the awesome art history class, and thank you too Dr. Elizabeth Perrill for preparing us for the biennial.

Back to New York City, one evening, I spoke to Empress Zingha a writer and a performer on Skype and told her I would love to filmed or take pictures of people acting in their homes and she told me, “why not a performance in the house.” I shouted out “YES!!!!” From there, we both brainstormed and I told myself “Why not a story?” I can still take photos of person’s story and let them perform in the photo shoot too. I was also inspired by Jeff Wall a Canadian photographer who creates a set and makes the photos look like if it was scene he documented. I love his work!

After a whole year, I finally returned to Barbados. I felt like I have to catch up with everyone, I felt so outdated. Right away, I announced on Facebook, I wanted actors for my upcoming projects. To my surprised, it was very difficult to find actors. I was like “Huh?” but I was very happy for those who approached me and decided to help me out, family, friends and few actors such as Kody Lashely, Deevon Clinton,Empress Zingha, Amery Butcher, Dondre Trotman, Katrina Harewood, Asha Feava, Simone Asia, Chris Headly, Dionne Headly, Adrian Richards, Roland Dyall, Rhea Bell, Shanice Wharton, Leanne Edgehill, Corie Rose, Tahira Cezont, Allison Thompson, Rosemary Allyene, Christopher Cozier, Richard Rawlins, Simon Pipe, Adrian Greene, Elaine Rose and Peter Rose.

I was very happy for those who help for making this ambitious projects possible, so far we did photoshoots called “Tattoo Man”, “Nipp Skirt”, “Fisherman reflecting” and “Four Men.” These shoots were true moments I experience and they are quite funny and very disturbing at the same time.

But we had a meeting for a very big project called…”A bit of Gossip, A bit of Privacy.” Hmmm I wondered why I name this performance piece so?

part 2 will be coming very soon! (Commerical voice)