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Bolton Institute   2002/2003

Gaynor Sweeney

he event is recorded as it happened, a live event in the public arena. The setting is an ancient tunnel in Sefton Park, Liverpool, England. A chicken and a veiled androgynous form set the scene, with a middle aged harpist presiding over the entrance to the archaic passageway. As the tender resonance of the harps strings fill the air, so too does the reality of the time and place this performance is actually happening: a chorus of birds, the rumble of traffic, the explosion of a plane fly over. However, reality is confined to the atmospheric reverberations, while a relationship between the chicken and shrouded participant commence.

Through no exchange of words, a discourse transpires, controlled by direction of chicken, who has harnessed the veiled figure. The dominance of chicken is dependent on the subordinate translating the interrelationship. Although this is symbiotic to realise their purpose, the chicken then discloses the identity of the shrouded figure to one of a Pre-Raphaelite female, only to govern this cultural form by bounding her to the chair. Ensnared, he can not escape, but for eternity canonised, as the chicken succumbs to mortality and rests as a relief on an ancient tomb.