Tending To, Alexis Bulman
A person stands facing a white wall with their back to the camera, arms extended straight up overhead. They wear a bright green short-sleeve jumpsuit cinched at the waist, with two back pockets and slightly tapered legs, and off-white sneakers. Their brown hair is tied back in a low ponytail. The figure’s posture suggests reaching, stretching, or carefully tending to something small on the wall near the top of the frame, though no object is clearly visible. The setting is minimal and quiet: a smooth white wall meets a grey concrete floor scattered with small white paint chips or debris. Subtle scuff marks and faint discolorations appear along the lower portion of the wall. The composition emphasizes verticality and negative space, with the vivid green garment contrasting sharply against the pale background, drawing attention to the act of reaching and the relationship between body and surface.
Title: Tending To
Artist: Alexis Bulman
Date: 2019
Medium/Materials: Video performance
Dimensions: 00:02:49
Form/Genre: Performance art, Video
Key Terms/Subject/Tags: Care; Memory; Disability
Artist Statement:
Alexis Bulman is an interdisciplinary artist based in Epekwitk’/ Prince Edward Island. Her sculpture and performance art work draws on community and collaboration to explore themes of climate adaptation, and access negotiations in public and private spaces. The artist’s investigations are achieved through deep engagements with materials and process. Bulman uses materials as sites for sharp and playful intervention, relying on the instincts of her own body and lived experience with disability to inform her conversations with site-specific places.
Bulman completed her BFA at NSCAD University in 2013 and has exhibited nationally in galleries such as The Confederation Centre Art Gallery, PEI, The Robert McLaughlin Gallery, ON and internationally at the Kelvin Gallery, Glasgow School of Art, Scotland, UK. Bulman has participated in ten artist residencies including Interrogating Access Residency with OBORO, QC, Connexion Artist Run Centre Residency, NB, and Art City Professional Guest Artist Series Residency,MB and received provincial support from the PEI Art Grants as well as national support from the Canada Council of the Arts.
Most recently, Bulman was a planning committee member for the inaugural Disability Atlantic Arts Symposium and worked as the Artistic Director at the Canadian Centre for Climate Change and Adaptation and works as the Digital Accessibility Program Officer at Creative PEI.
Cultural Context / Story Behind the Work:
Video performance based on the artist's experience as the third generation of women in her family to share the same disability and medical procedures, it is a reflection of the care shown to her.
Butterfly closures are white adhesive strips applied across minor lacerations in a manner that pulls the skin on either side of the wound together.
The surface of a wall is carefully examined for paint chips, cracks, nail holes, etc. With each discovered wound, the performer opens a butterfly closure package, allows its wax backings to flutter to the ground, applies the butterfly closure to the area and presses it gently to ensure a good stick. The performance occurs in silence and ends once every wound on the wall has been tended to, and the ground is covered in the accumulated wax backings of the butterfly closures.
Importantly, the Tending To performance is not concerned with fixing the wall, but demonstrating the act of thoughtful attention and care.
Rights for this Image:
This digital image is licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0. You are free to share it for non-commercial purposes, as long as you credit the artist.
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