The Kotel, also known a the Western Wall or the Wailing Wall is the holiest site in the world for Jews.  For many people, to go to the Wall is a very emotional experience.  I've heard people talk about the experience and I've seen people sobbing their eyes out, pouring out their hearts, talking about being at the Wall with looks of rapture on their faces.  I wanted that!  I live in Jerusalem and have been to the Wall often.  Something always seemed to be between me and connecting to the space.  I had a 30 second glimpse of the sensation months before and wanted to break through whatever barrier was there.  My thought was to spend an extended period of time there - to get so tired, perhaps, that I could break through.  I chose 26 hours.  26 is the gematria of one of the names of G-d - the name that signifies mercy and expanse of time.  I chose to perform the piece on Rosh Chodesh Iyar - May 3-5, 2011.  The timing was during the Omer, Chesed of Tiferet.  I started at 11pm on the 3rd and finished at 1am on the 5th.  I took a photo every hour from wherever I was sitting at the time.

I'm not going to say that the piece was a failure - but I'm also not going to say it was a success other than I finished.  I didn't take a number of things into consideration.  The Kotel during the Omer is a very busy place.  I was hoping for a lot of quiet time and it was pretty bustling with the exception of 2-3am.  I didn't have the breakthrough I was hoping for and I'm not that happy with the photos.  I've been at the Wall overnight before and thought the changes in the sky especially in the dawn were amazing.  I wasn't there to take photos other than to document the time passing, and so I kept myself to my plan to only take a photo on the hour.

Bye Bye Baby (Hair Action) is a meditation on infertility and loss.  I brushed my hair while recounting the story of the Little Mermaid by Hans Christian Anderson.  After I had collected enough hair, I braided it into strands.  It had been falling out quite a bit at the time, so there were a number of strands.  I lit a braided candle (a havdalah candle which is lit at the end of the sabbath in Judaism to mark the separation between the sabbath and the rest of the week).  I then burned the strands of hair while singing Send in the Clowns by Judy Collins.

Art Concept 3, 2006, Performance Festival, St Petersburg, Russia