Lizz Khan

Vigilia i

The term vigil is relational to a surveillance, a lookout or "to watch." In this first iteration of my thesis research, I have taken pages from Sir John A MacDonald's biography in the book "The Great Men of Canada." I paint over the pages with opaque black acrylic paint. The end result is a shrine within a sculptural installation.

“In order to define the personal pleasure of erasing, I have decided to follow up such a process with a vigil. The definitions of a vigil according to the Merriam Webster Dictionary are: “the act of keeping awake at times when sleep is customary; a period of wakefulness; an event or a period of time when a person or group stays in a place and quietly waits, prays, etc., especially at night; a watch formerly kept on the night before a religious feast with prayer or other devotions the day before a religious feast observed as a day of spiritual preparation; evening or nocturnal devotions or prayers—usually used in a plural.” This interpretation of a vigil entails the repetition of repressing a memory, an extension of what I later research as erasure. ”