WEBVTT

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I do feel very proud to say

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that I've contributed in some way

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to awareness around sexual assault

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and issues of gendered
violence and even racism.

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and generally overwhelmed
by the situation I was in,

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like mattress performance and the entire

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media frenzy that came out of that.

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In the past year, I've felt really

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supported by my community.

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I think it's allowed me to make

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a sort of more quiet,
meditative reflection

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on the things that sustain me in life.

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"The Floating World" is
the title of this show.

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It comes from the Japanese word "ukiyo.”.

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This term "ukiyo" came to prominence

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in the Edo period in Tokyo,
when there was this

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sudden blossoming of
geishas, Kabuki theater,

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pleasure quarters, bathhouses—

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various areas of the city where you could

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go to escape the sort of
drudgery of everyday life.

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There's also kind of a play on word,

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because it's homophonous
with the Buddhist term

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for the world of sorrow and grief.

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So there's this kind of understanding

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that if you were to escape
to one of these places,

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there's some sort of underlying

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sorrow and grief that's motivating you.

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I came up with the idea for
this show when I was doing

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this performance called
“The Ship is Sinking,”

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in which I was bound but in ropes.

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This is type of bondage is called “shibari,”

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which is a Japanese traditional
art of rope bondage.

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It's obviously a very painful experience.

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At the same time, I was thinking about

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how it's kind of the epitome of support.

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That's actually kind of a perfect metaphor

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for our relationships with loved ones.

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Often, our bonds with our loved ones

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can be tenuous or painful,
but at the end of the day,

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they're the ones that support you.

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They're the ones that lift you
up and hold you together.

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In this show, I've used
shibari-style bondage

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to suspend these portraits
of my family and friends.

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What's exciting about this piece for me

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is that it feels like I'm
dealing with the same topics of:

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How do you heal from trauma,

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what does support look like,
what does strength look like?

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I looked at The New York Times one day.

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The headline read something like,

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"Chuck Close Has Been
Accused of Sexual Harassment.

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Should His Artwork Carry an Asterisk?"

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And the journalist goes around
interviewing museum directors.

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the paintings by men who are accused

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of sexual harassment, our
museum walls will be bare."

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It really hurt to read their reactions

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because an asterisk is such
a small punctuation mark,

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but it represents a huge, terrible thing

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that happens to so many
victims and survivors,

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and it's a lived-in, bodied experience.

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I always wonder what
would have been different

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about my sexual assault
hearing back at Columbia

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had it happened this year,
rather than back then.

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The fact that we're at a
point where there exists

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a campaign called #MeToo
is huge progress.

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Nowadays, survivors are
taken a bit more seriously

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when they come out as a group—

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and we did that, and
Columbia shut us down.