YOU ARE INVITED TO CONFESSION
Confessions is an on-going project since 2010. A series of installations, interventions and performances focused on the act of Confession, the giving and receiving of Absolution, and Acts of Penance.
Confessions are anonymous, a private act, an intimate conversation between Confessor and Confessant, Artist and Individual. However they are utilised in public displays.
Confessions began with a 'Sorry Board', inviting people to leave their unspoken apologies on brightly-coloured post-it notes.
I held on to these notes, these secret confessions, unsure what to do with them, unable to get rid of them. I felt responsible for them, a guardian, they were weighted with a myriad emotions and trust in the absolution of the act of confessing them.
I began to read them, publicly, absolving the sin, in acts that were simultaneously my own Penance. Some I let fly away. Some I still keep.
The project has manifested in different locations and guises. Its most recent 'reincarnation' was a Confessions(phone)Booth in Swansea City Centre, with participants provided with a direct line to Confession.
People stayed on the line, waiting to be absolved, to be given some resolution or to be asked for contrition, given an act of penance to complete.
As the artist, I began to question who had the authority to absolve anyone else of sin. And what are we seeking, when we confess?
Can we take on the sins of others? Does this count as absolution for the confessant, or penance for the confessor?
I am currently investigating the history (or myth) of Sin Eaters, and developing the project surrounding the absorption of someone else's sins.
Confessions are anonymous, a private act, an intimate conversation between Confessor and Confessant, Artist and Individual. However they are utilised in public displays.
Confessions began with a 'Sorry Board', inviting people to leave their unspoken apologies on brightly-coloured post-it notes.
I held on to these notes, these secret confessions, unsure what to do with them, unable to get rid of them. I felt responsible for them, a guardian, they were weighted with a myriad emotions and trust in the absolution of the act of confessing them.
I began to read them, publicly, absolving the sin, in acts that were simultaneously my own Penance. Some I let fly away. Some I still keep.
The project has manifested in different locations and guises. Its most recent 'reincarnation' was a Confessions(phone)Booth in Swansea City Centre, with participants provided with a direct line to Confession.
People stayed on the line, waiting to be absolved, to be given some resolution or to be asked for contrition, given an act of penance to complete.
As the artist, I began to question who had the authority to absolve anyone else of sin. And what are we seeking, when we confess?
Can we take on the sins of others? Does this count as absolution for the confessant, or penance for the confessor?
I am currently investigating the history (or myth) of Sin Eaters, and developing the project surrounding the absorption of someone else's sins.
