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Span II, Tracy Rose







On the 2nd Johannesburg Biennale, Rose presented Span I and Span II. In this, Rose sat with shaved head on a sideways TV displaying a closeup image of a reclining nude, a classic art history image. Head bent, Rose busied herself with knotting strands of her own shaven hair. The bravura performance took place inside a glass cabinet. Rose says, "With my naked body on the TV I wanted to negate the passivity of the action of the reclining nude. In doing the piece, I had to confront what I wasn't supposed to do with my body. The work is a cleansing act, a coming out. The knotting not only invokes the rosary beads of my childhood, but also the working with one's hands, and the meaning of this handiwork as a form of empowerment". In Span I, the complementary part of the piece, a red-overalled prisoner incised text on to the opposite wall of the gallery, memories from Rose's childhood, often dealing with the role that hair, how straight it was, how curly, and thus how it defined race, had played in her childhood. "The wall's a purge É and a perversion of the idea of a lack of penance, where I become vindicated through the act of employing an ex-prisoner to 'perform' my confession."