I rent a hotel room, move in and unpack my suitcase, making myself comfortable. Hang my clothing inside the closet,
set up my toiletry bag on the basin counter, take a shower, relax and watch television. Order room service.

During the exhibition, visitors are invited to come into my room without me there. I become vulnerable and exposed. They can inspect and investigate what is in the closet see what I had ordered, what I planned to do, what I read. Even my ethnicity by looking closely at hair that was left on the bathtub. They can reach into my pockets and find receipts and residue and
fragments of my life. What channel on television did I watch? The trash might reveal something else, the blinking phone
messages might lead them to another story about me. Clues are all over this small room. Then they can paint a mental
picture of who I am.

Meanwhile, I’ll be taking photos of the performance of visitors invading the space and also clues that I leave in a corner
of the room. I’ll also bring back things from the hotel that became part of me; like slipper, amenities (shampoo, soap, shower cap), note pad, laundry bag, no dot disturb sign, hand towels. These will be purchasable artwork that will be available
after the exhibit.

This performance and installation are influenced by Allan Kaprow’s philosophy that the practice of art is more than the
production of artworks; it also involves the artist’s disciplined effort to observe, engage, and interpret the processes of living, which are themselves as meaningful as most art, and certainly more grounded in common experience. In fact they are
common experience.

The project also gives credit to the art fair for the clever use of the hotel room as exhibition space, in contrast I use the room as an art piece.

Participation engages both our minds and bodies in actions that transform art into experience and esthetic into meaning.
Our experience as participants is one of meaningful transformation, blurring the boundaries between of art and life.

Self-portrait, 2007, Miami Pool Art Fair (Proposed Idea)
Images executed in The Elliott House Inn, Charleston, South Carolina, October, 2007