Patient Zero

Multimedia Installation

[Surgical Table, Surgical Side Table, Surgical Instruments, Microphone, Soil, Video, Audio]

2022

The staging of an emergency room seeks to invoke a parallel between the pseudo-medical, deeply invasive yet fundamentally ineffective practices of the 20th century Western scientific apparatus and the performativity of the global political power structure in its handling of the climate crisis. Extractivism and aversion masquerade as bold, but futile, declarations, echoing the now refuted procedure of “bloodletting” as a cure for various ailments.

The surgical table serves as the embodiment and materialization of imminent terrestrial decay, occurring right on the threshold of systemic subjugation and blatant theatricality of responsible parties.

Mariam Janashia

Featured in the exhibition A Few Degrees of Change at SCENE Metrospace, in conjunction with 1.5ºC, sponsored by the Michigan State University Museum and Science Gallery Detroit

Surgical Table, Surgical Side Table, and Surgical Instruments on loan from the Michigan State University Museum