In the early summer of 2020 when images and renderings of the COVID19 virus started to come out, the extravagant beauty of it struck me. I was drawn to those red spikes with strange curly edges, the spherical shape, sometimes shown as yellow, or purple, and the peculiar ways tendrils seemed to pulsate and morph. If COVID was a performer, it’d be a Diva: ravishing, electric, and compelling with an insatiable hunger for attention and adoration. I mused how one might make a COVID costume, and set that thought aside.
In July, we received our Scientific American with an article about COVID by Mark Fischetti and I began to explore the stunning online interactive graphics by a team headed by artist Veronica Falconieri Hays. I didn’t know it then, but the first text in this ChoreOVID is from this piece.
The next influence came from reading here and there about Friluftsliv – a Norwegian word for enjoying the outdoors, meaning “life in fresh air.” The pandemic has forced us to re-think public spaces and to embrace the elements, as we can avoid the horrors of COVID transmission a little better outdoors. With my Norwegian blood, this word/concept particularly charmed me.
Finally, watching the RNA Messenger vaccines develop has been fascinating and encouraging. My second text about vaccines comes from the journal “Nature” in an article by Elie Dolgin here. The vaccine development all moved at an unprecedented pace, yet some combination of naivety, uncoordinated logistics, and social media noise, conspired to make a mysteriously moving target of a date of when we would get the vaccine. It seemed always so many months away, and then so many months away again, and then again, and now “in the coming weeks” and that again, and again.
Happily, at the time of this writing, the ever so gradual increase in vaccinations is giving us hope of a taming of the virus in the coming weeks....months? (The Diva’s long run may be closing due to dwindling audiences). In fact, the very day we made this video, my husband Ric was able to schedule his first vaccine.
So all the influences I’ve written about here came together for this #18… filmed on one of our coldest Ohio days at 18 degrees Fahrenheit. I researched things that could be “spikes” on my costume and landed on little cat toys, bought at my local pet store and sewn onto my costume. An amusing exchange ensued as I bought a pile of over 20 cat toys – “how many cats do you have?”…. “um… none?”
As I wind down this series of 19 ChoreOVIDs, it felt apt to end on a note of learning science, appreciating the vaccine development, and honoring the deep ecology of our place in the world outside of our sheltering walls. I hope the last image spells hope.
The video: https://vimeo.com/510358067