Erin Clark
Image: We look over Dr. Preston's shoulder and see the text 'Disability as gazed upon' on his laptop screen. Above that, Erin is spinning on a fuchsia coloured aerial rope, holding her body away from the rope in an inverted position with her arms outstretch. Behind her there are people sitting and standing along the gallery wall watching (and filming) her dance and Dr. Preston's lecture.
Image by Mariam Waliji
Visual Pleasure is an innovative, hybrid aerial dance/lecture.
Facing off against Associate Professor Dr. Preston, aerialist and performance artist Erin Clark, plays with a tension between academic authority and personal experience as ways of knowing --and presenting-- oneself.
Both Jeff and Erin are disabled. As wheelchair users, disabilities highly visible, they are often positioned as objects of study and novelty when they are viewed in public. A position often considered disempowered. Visual Pleasure explores what happens when the object is also the active agent. What does it mean to be 'starred at' when you are a performer? What happens to the lecture when it is given by one who is viewed as a novelty?
Visual Pleasure asks how people experience themselves as ‘viewers’ —can our gaze bring life and nourishment to that upon which we gaze? Where is the authority —in the one who draws attention, or the one who gives it?