The Hunger, 1998: Ivan Dougherty Gallery

Jill Orr

7 Oct - 10 Dec 1998

Version 1 was performed in 1998 at the Ivan Dougherty gallery, Sydney for Telling Tales, Trauma and Memory, Cross Cultural Perspectives, curated by Jill Bennett and Jackie Dunn.

This work was an immediate response to my experience during the Myer Windows installation where the performances were behind the glass windows of the Bourke Street Mall. During the work, I saw drug overdoses, the homeless and a child who was in the audience daily. This child was not like the multitude of others; he was angry, aggressive and yet absorbed. His mother and he were followed one day only to discover that his mother was in the streets for her daily heroin hit. I could not get his hopeless state from my mind. The Hunger is a Pieta Study. I was asking questions such as: does Hitler’s mother love him, despite authoring mass genocide? Does the mother of the serial killer still love the child? Do we love abberation that is born from ourselves? The lamb I birthed was dead. Due to its huge original size, it was reconstructed and sewn together anew to make it relative to my size. This has added another layer to the reading, from Frankenstein to genetic manipulation. Version 2 and 3 was performed in 2000 for the International Performance Art Festival, Quebec City, Quebec and for 11a 7b Art Festival, Toronto, Canada.