Red Carpet / Mixed Blood Buffalo Ballgown

Red Carpet / Mixed Blood Buffalo Ballgown
various street locations, Toronto, ON 1996

Taffeta gown, acrylic paint, real-time hand-painting.

A symbolic multi-media welcome for the return of the Buffalo Nation, Red Carpet began with the creation of the Mixed-Blood Buffalo Ball Gown, a taffeta ball gown adorned with hand-painted ledger style buffalo. The cream colored dress is painted so that it appears half red & half white. Many small red buffalo emerge from the red half of the dress, bound across the white half, and disappear into the red again.

In the first aspect of the Red Carpet performance I wore the Buffalo Ball Gown while hand-painting the same small ledger art style buffalo as graffiti around the city of Toronto. During this period I also painted a larger Red Carpet wall mural at a performance art event held in a large abandoned building, also in Toronto. The mural had many of these red buffalo galloping amongst numerous cars.

Both on the street and at the performance event, these painting actions were documented and the footage and dress were later exhibited together.