Ranchero by Jamie McMurry

Performance
October 23, 2010Mercer Union, 1286 Bloor Street West, Toronto6:00 pm

Curated and presented by FADO Performance Art Centre at the 7a*11d International Festival of Performance Art.

American artist Jamie McMurry’s epic new performance work, Ranchero, begins inside at Mercer Union and using a moving vehicle filled with audience members moves to a second location.

The cacophonous actions and objects that one encounters in everyday life are not only often absurd but also are the unseen details that define our characters and separate us from all others as individual beings. McMurry’s recent performance installation works as part of the Ego series have sought to make manifest these day-to-day actions and interactions with objects to illustrate a vocabulary with the outside world that has been developed over the span of his life. Ego instalments 1-4 have been presented in Bangkok, Los Angeles, Glasgow and Séte, France and have typically taken place in very small spaces over the course of several hours. This context only allows for a few viewers to see the ongoing work for a short period and leaves them with a fraction of a glance into the biography being depicted in these performances, much as we all encounter one another’s biographies in everyday life. With Ranchero McMurry continues to share this language of one’s history through performative acts but instead of having the viewers pass through the work, the work will pass through the viewer.

© Jamie McMurry, Ranchero, 2010. Photos Henry Chan.


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Books & Ephemera

Performance Yellow

This fragrance opens us to the question, has the show started? It's winter, the theatre is colder than the street and the room is filled with people and all their winter smells: wet faux leather, down, too much shampoo, and beer breath. The atmosphere is a trickster. Am I late, am I early?

Top Notes

yellow mandarin, mimosa

Middle Notes

honey, chamomile, salt

Base Notes

narcissus, guaiac wood, piss, beer