Death, the Bride of Life.
My grandmother died last week.
I got the call the day after I arrived in Latvia. I walked and walked and walked. Body hurled into motion, as if possessed by another’s churn. I walked valleys and hills, spring’s green a frizzled burst. Meadows propositioned by dandelions, by clover.
I walked until I could not walk anymore. Latvia, land where I can walk forever.
The exhibition opens in five days and I marvel at the synchronicity, its horror and alignment…
Death, the bride of Life. Life, the bride of Death.
I am, of course, unable to travel for the funeral.
I tread water between the worlds, my spirit in parallel with hers. Waves thump against heaven’s shore. How long for a soul to ascend?
I count the minutes between contractions.
Destiny grips me by the throat.
Destruction Is and Is Not Forever opens on Thursday, May 15th at 16h—the date coinciding with the 110th anniversary of my family’s deportation from the region.
As part of the opening events, I will lead a private performance in the gallery. Thirty people from all over the world will join me in the exhibition hall, which is the sanctuary of my family’s abducted synagogue.
As the sun’s evening light pours through the windows, I will lead a traditional Kabbalat Shabbat service, conjuring sounds that haven’t been heard in over century. Initially, the synagogue was constructed by the Jews of Sabile in 1875. In 1941, German and Latvian soldiers set fire to the building and the mikveh below. They marched the remaining Jews into the forest and forced them to dig their own grave. Bang bang in a pit. Under Soviet Occupation, the synagogue became a warehouse for storing vegetables and fruit. When the Soviet Union fell, the building was purchased by sculptor Ojars Feldbergs, who restored the shul with funding from the European Union in 2002. Now it belongs to the Talsi Municipality and functions as an art gallery.
Every day, on my way to the exhibition hall, I walk past my family’s stolen home. When I do, I repeat the show’s title to myself like a spell: Destruction Is and Is Not Forever. Destruction Is and Is Not Forever.
I wait to be born.
R E A D I N G S
sky hammer by Julian Talamantez Brolaski
Cachexia by Max Ritvo
excerpt from Myung Mi Kim’s Civil Bound