Spectators near City Hall got quite the eyeful on Wednesday, Feb. 29, when Tasha Diamant and her team of unveiled volunteers exposed just how “Vulnerable” they are to Douglas Street traffic.
Diamant has made a vow this year to take her interactive performance, the Human Body Project, outside at least once a month for all of 2012. January’s display was at Cadboro Bay Beach, and Diamant says she’s working up slowly.
“Cadboro Bay was pretty easy, Douglas Street was certainly tougher, and I’m thinking next — or at least in the future — we’re going to aim for a temple of consumerism: a shopping mall or something,” says Diamant. “But we’re mindful of people’s reactions to this, so we hold up the letters of ‘Vulnerable’ out of respect to those sensitivities.”
Despite what onlookers might initially think, Diamant’s mission isn’t about exibitionism or nudity — it’s about the vulnerability of all humans.
“When you tell people ‘We’re vulnerable,’ they kind of say, ‘Yeah, sure.’ But when you show them, they have an instant emotional reaction,” says Diamant. “We had people walking by stop, ask what we were doing, then join in. It went really well.”
Police were called to the event, but the group was dressed by the time VicPD arrived. No tickets were issued to the dozen or so participants.
To find out more, or partake in Diamant’s next performance, visit humanbodyproject.com. M