Acts of Kindness at Elsewhere
In October I was an artist in residence at ‘Elsewhere‘ in Greensboro, North Carolina, US.
Elsewhere is a living museum in a former thrift store on the main street of Greensboro. The artists and organisors of the museum live on site in the old three story house, and the premise of the residency is that you bring nothing in, and take nothing out, but constantly remake the museum with the stuff you find there. And there's a lot of it!
Elsewhere functions as a living community and so the daily life activities and us doing them in the museum are as much a a part of the organism of elsewhere as the quirky objects and spaces that house it. The kitchen was my favourite installation, that and the ghost room. It's open to the public about half the time, so you constantly have people walking through your living and making environments.
One of my favourite moments was swinging on the swings in the streetfront window when a passerby stopped, backed up, looked at me and said, "oh, I thought you were living art". "We are!" replied the producution intern next to me.
During my time at Elsewhere I scattered as many acts of kindness throughout the building and community as possible. This was my performative concern while I was there, and I left little kindness instigators behind to incite further acts of kindness to be performed. I chose not to have a web page where people could record their acts of kindness, silently allowing people to value the actions for themselves as a gesture of unconditional generosity, holding the embodied experience in the highest regard.
I gave each member of the community an act of kindness to perform as they will, and place wherever they would like to, for others to find.
