10 Minutes Of Video
‘PHOENIX’ (2024)
‘Phoenix (2024)’ - Video documentation by Baiba Sprance and Marco Berardi. Performed as part of Holding The Shadow While Calling Back The Light at CT20 Gallery, Folkestone. UK. 2024
‘Phoenix (2024)’ - is a re-performance (2024) of Sebastian’s earlier work of the same name (2013) - exploring grief, longing, desire and transformation - on the occasion of their solo exhibition - Holding The Shadow While Calling Back The Light - at CT20 in Folkestone. The video documentation of Phoenix (2024) is now on consignment with the video art streaming platform; LUCID
Sebastian stands waiting, nude. Hugging a large ball of paper, they slowly expand this and enter it. Expanding the form - creating a temporary cocoon - Sebastian lights matches, illuminating their inclosure. They then set fire to it from within.
Emerging from the flames, Sebastian gilds themself with gold pigments and clothes which they draw from their interior spaces (throat and anus). A bell rings out as Sebastian leaves a wake of glitter, smoke and ash.
Phoenix is a meditation on both the power and necessity of deconstruction/renewal in the aid of transformation, growth and decolonial endeavours.
‘3 REFLECTIONS²’ (2022)
‘3 Reflections²’ - Video documentation by Baiba Sprance and Marco Berardi. Performed as part of FUTURE RITUAL at the Institute of Contemporary Art, London. UK. 2024
3 Reflections² - is a live performance installation - exploring cycles of grief relating to gender identity & dysphoria, violence, and (be)longing - enacted on the occasion of the group exhibition - FUTURE RITUAL - at the Institute of Contemporary Art in London. The video documentation of 3 Reflections² is now on consignment with the video art streaming platform; LUCID
In an expansive, low-lit and blackened venue, Sebastian cycles repeatedly through three performance stations, shifting from station to station at 20 minute intervals, across three hours.
At each station they don a bespoke, fitted hood (Mirrored, Blackout, Lace) and engages a primary object or collaborator (Chrome & Glass Body Harness, A Tattoo Artist, A Mirror) through a combination of vocal and somatic gestures that layer, loop and repeat across time.
3 Reflections² is both an exploration of, and resistance to, the colonising forces of cis-heteronormativity upon the mind-bodies and spirits of queer people.
Both ‘Phoenix (2024)’ and ‘3 Reflections²’ were made possible with support from the following partners:
