Artworks

PINK LEMONADE

Pink Lemonade explores the complexities of our increasingly virtual lives and the effects of social separation as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic placed our real and virtual dichotomies into stark contrast. Here, Pink Lemonade becomes an allegory for the interactions that were put on pause, and in many cases, replaced with virtual alternatives that can’t quite substitute for reality.

Particularly for younger generations, the abrupt transition to a distanced, cybernetic experience meant they would need to quickly readjust to a new mode of being. Pink Lemonade is an interactive public performance installation in a cafe space where the participants are transported off the streets of Wynwood, Miami into an old fashioned Texas cafe. Participants are either seated at a table in the café or call into via Zoom. Regardless of whether they are physically or virtually present, they are served pink lemonade and a slice of pie made by the artist and are attended to by a live server. The experience of the installation is intended to highlight the distinction between the social and emotional understanding of in-person versus on-screen interactions. 

Pink Lemonade draws from the artist’s previous interactive installations Mud Pie Café 2012 and FMLMBD, both of which considered the role of authenticity in lived experience. The work calls for its viewers to further question the contrasts between our collective and individualized experiences of this era of social separation. Pink Lemonade invites viewers to ponder their own attitudes towards virtual versus in-person interactions.  

"This is the modern day Narcissus dilemma – we gaze into screen images until the outer world disappears."

Mud Pie Café (Pink Lemonade Installation), 2021