performance | 2018 | Watermill Center 25th Gala
The performance Assaulted Landscape with Splattered Rivers and No Place to Hide
first took place during the Watermill Center Gala. For two hours Stephen j Shanabrook
stood enclosed inside a plexiglass octagon cell erratically pointing his laser and shooting
the paintball gun “at” the public, protected by transparent walls. 5,000 paintball bullets
were filled by the artist with acrylic paint in order to create a large abstract painting on
plastic sheets. Being “ shot” at with an assault-type paint gun and laser pointer increased
the effect of the public being targeted. Needless to say, the performance is raising one
of the main aspects of public thoughts in the world and especially in America today,
namely that we are targets of our own actions. “Assaulted Landscape” forces viewers
into the uneasy, provocative situation between the shooter and the public: many
of the viewers were gladly experiencing the situation “to be shot” by standing next
to the glass waiting for the “gunman” to unload the magazine onto them. The artist brings
to the surface the disaster of a dialog or rather the monologue of an aggressive loner,
stuck in a glass tower, panicking in a transparent cage, unable to communicate except
for “screaming” for “to hear my colors” shots. Hunter or victim? With this powerful image
Stephen j Shanabrook portrays the Carnival of a Disconnection. It is a visually and
conceptually striking portrait of a man in our disconnected society, the man who
is afraid of showing his real face but instead hiding it behind a deer mask with
one broken horn; in the battle? running away? or most likely in an attempt to
hurt himself… With this performance, Shanabrook continues to display
the main theme of his artistic practice — a unique vision of surreal beauty
formed on the brink of disaster, the never-ending link between Fun and Sorrow,
Beauty and Violence. The artist’s vision comes very close to the edge where
one usually decides to turn back.