In the audio clip on this page (which played in a video in the exhibition) Ruth, introduces her restorative project —
“Recently, I came across these melancholic engravings in discarded couches that I decided to recline on. After a bit of contemplation, I decided to give them a new life and a chance to promote growth by breaking them down into mulch for plants! My pursuit of justice has developed my role on The Unit — that of restoration.”
In the video documentation for Ruth’s project we see her sitting on two different couches with poems carved into their cushions, reading “your capacity to denounce is not determined by consensus” and “what’s the exchange… some imponderable dust… bound by mysterious emanations… the invisible center.” Then we see her sawing one of the couches into small pieces. Ruth took theses melancholic and toxic lounging objects and composted them into mulch to grow vegetables. Her contribution to the exhibition were three clear planters on the floor with the chopped up pieces of couch at the bottom, soil on top of that and then vegetables being grown out of the soil. She was attempting to deconstruct those stale and futile containers for bodies and reinvigorate them into vital sustenance for existence.
Photos from the exhibition.
Clip of Ruth's video documenting her restoring.
Video stills.