Autumn – Canberra

Title: Autumn, ANU School of Art, Canberra, 2000
Medium: Performance
Year: 2000

A 30 minute performance, exploring how unresolved memories of a traumatic separation from Blaide’s birth mother into institutional care, (as a very little person) affected her journey into adult hood. The work investigates the process of not being aware of how painful unresolved experiences can weight heavily on present interactions and then poetically illustrates the relief of acknowledging these painful memories, opening up new ways of interacting and digesting present moments in time.

Wrapped in bandages and weighed down by a cocoon of psychological baggage on her back, Blaide goes about her daily life, until she stumbles across a pear dangling from the sky. Reaching out to grab it she misses and collapses and so begins her process of unraveling the bandages. Liberating herself from her cocoon she discovers autumn leaves, once they were her fresh informative life experiences, now they are old and heavy and serve no fruitful purpose. A few leaves are treasured and pocketed into her hand bag, the rest thrown into the air. Now Blaide is able to reach for that pear, and is refreshed by its juicy texture.

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