The Birthing of Mango

It was a Friday afternoon and I was getting ready. At 7:30 p.m. on the 15th of June there was to be an event. That event would kick start a new project. A finding out of ones self. Lauren Kratz would die and Mango would be born. Mango would be the new, and Lauren, along with the baggage carried by her, would be put to an eternal rest.

Glitter and junk left overs on the floor of Edge

We arrived with anticipation of what was to come. Camera bag in tow we pulled up to the Edge Gallery in Denver. It was a hot day and the night was like a fresh roll, soft, warm, and comforting. There were people milling about waiting for the next performance to start. It was 7:27. There was wreckage left on the floor from the prior performances. Sand, glitter, and saw dust cluttered the floor space and clung to my flip flops. We swam around in the crowd and mingled with people I knew. "What did we miss?" "Well, this girl just finished pretending to cut something out of her uterus" "ah... kinda glad I missed that one" ...


The music begins to play and we are all called to attention. There is a space prepped for Mango. She comes out, pink wig on, teal dress tight and short, with a pink bowling shirt tied around her slim frame. She struts over to her station through the crowd and has her cupcakes (the ones we had prepared the night before), they are missing their candles. She takes a few seconds and one by one travels from a pile of candles on the floor to lighting them and placing them with care into one cupcake. As she continues in this cadence a man comes out. 


Dressed in a hat, suit jacket, and shorts with boat shoes, he carries a paint supply box over his shoulder. He places it in her space and sets up shop. He pulls out a mango fruit pack and sips off the juice as she continues to light candles one by one. She offers him one, he blows out the candle, takes it, and bites in. He passes her the fruit cup. They take communion. 


Things progress to painting objects, they paint a computer screen that was on the ground, then take turns painting the other in long strokes. From there you witness wrapping in cords. There are wires and cords about. A VHS is broken and wrapped around her slender legs. As this all happens a paparazzi man keeps snapping shots of this event. So much media is going on and you feel the suffocation of this world and the entertainment we surround ourselves with. She stands to let us soak up the image.

"Performance art is every emotion you feel from looking at a painting, acted out in your face"
 ~ Lauren Kratz

The paparazzi and suit jacket man end up wrapped in wires together quietly conversing while we make out what is happening to Lauren.


She steps onto a platform in the crowd and a man emerges from the sea with a dress. This dress is unique and destined to make a statement. This man proceeds to take off the wires, to free her from the bonds we watch her put on. After she is free of the cord and tape he helps her out of her pink jacket and into her new dress and prep her for her new name and new life. 


She ceremoniously steps off the platform and approach documents that have been taped to the wall. They are legal and binding. She finds a pen from the mess on the floor. She slowly signs her birth name as the music continues to pound. She draws a line through new last name, middle name, and slowly spells out M-a-n-g-o in the first name space. 


She has done it. 


To wrap up the performance she finds a paint brush with black paint and draws her name Lauren on the second document... she pauses and crosses it out. She turns and faces the crowd. Without a word she holds her head high and slowly leaves the room. She has left her old life on the wall in the gallery. She has now become  a statement like the dress she now wears. We are silent. The men wrapped in wire take time to make a frame around her documents. They also leave and the performance is over. We clap.


The journey has begun. In months ahead of us we will follow Mango in her new life to discover what it is like to change ones identity. She is fearless now. She is a walking performance. Who is she now? She is Mango.

MANGO

left over birthday cake

Excited we stand for the exploration
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Mango is here and the fear is gone

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Celebrate and learn with us. It will be an adventure.

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