In the courtyard of department of art at UC Irvine, a nine-meter spiral staircase was installed. The stairs did not have steps, just the tin framework. The project consisted of an artist walking up and down the stairs for an hour with nothing on but a pair of rubber boots. Wood-made triangle boards which bore the shape of the steps to the stairs were adhered to the rubber boots. The artist walked around up and down repeatedly the stairs for an hour, holding a stick with a red dot which covered his genital area and trying to fit the wooden board into the frame of the stair case each step of the way. The performance ended when the artist climbed down the stairs and threw the red dot to the audience.

This piece actually responds to Duchamp’s Nude Descending a Staircase. Usually, women are the ones often objectified in art and often the object of appreciation. Therefore, I thought, it was about time that men took over the hard work. This piece was a kind of self-mockery since it was a male who was positioned in an awkward and rather embarrassing situation. Step by step, the male performer climbed up the stairs wearing ridiculous boots, placing himself in the frame of the staircase each step of the way. However, he still needed to descend in the end. The black spiraling staircase resembled the control of social system has over humans and how humans fit into the frameworks and the norms of life step by step. What is ridiculous is that even though humans ascend the staircase or become assimilated, their destiny is still to come down the steps and return to point zero in the end. This shows that no matter how far one goes, one will never reach the destinations. Efforts would merely be made in vain by trying to conceal one’s nudity, vulnerability, and awkwardness. There seems to be no exceptions to this rule. This is simply a metaphor to all our lives.