Jess Dobkin
About
Jess Dobkin has been a working artist, curator, community activist, teacher and mentor for more than 30 years. Her practice extends across theatres and galleries, art fairs and subway stations, international festivals and museums, universities and public archives. She has operated an artist-run newsstand in a vacant subway station kiosk, a soup kitchen for artists, a breast milk tasting bar, and a performance festival hub for kids. Her projects have been supported by the Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Toronto Arts Council, the Franklin Furnace Fund for Performance Art, the ASTREA Foundation, The Theatre Centre , and other institutional and community partners. She has taught as a Sessional Lecturer at OCAD University and the University of Toronto and was a Fellow at the Mark S. Bonham Centre for Sexual Diversity Studies at the University of Toronto. She received a 2018-2019 Chalmers Arts Fellowship to support her research in international performance art archives and was Artist-in-Residence at the Hemispheric Institute for Performance and Politics at New York University. Jess is Performing Archives Lead and Collaborating Artist of Hemispheric Encounters: Developing Transborder Research-Creation Practices (SSHRC). Recent projects include her artist commission For What It’s Worth for the Wellcome Collection, London, UK and her solo exhibition, Jess Dobkin’s Wetrospective at the Art Gallery of York University (AGYU) curated by Emelie Chhangur. Her first monograph, Jess Dobkin’s Wetrospective: Constellating Performance Archives. Edited by Laura Levin and designed by Lisa Kiss Design (Intellect Books/AGYU, 2024) is now available to purchase in the US and in Canada and in the UK and Europe. Her film and video works are distributed by Vtape and traces of her performance work are held in performance art archives internationally.
Previously
2023
For What It's Worth
Installation as part of the exhibition, Milk. Commissioned by Wellcome Collection, London, UK, and curated by Honor Beddard and Marianne Templeton.
2022
Holding Coburn
Inspired by Wendy Coburn’s life and practice, this performance activation explores the purpose of artworks, how we engage with and take care of them, and what goes into creating them. Behind a wall at Onsite Gallery where a restrospec-tive of Coburn’s work is exhibited, Jess transforms a storage room into a nursery. Visitors are invited to sit and hold Wendy’s sculpture molds.
Dinner Party Series
A series of online dinner parties for artists, academics, archivists, and activists to gather across borders, languages, time zones, and cultures for sensory, intimate connection in pandemic times. A collaboration with Joyce LeeAnn Joseph and Shalon T. Webber-Heffernan.
You’re Invited
A series of offerings at the Fierce Festival, Birmingham, UK, that included elements of the Wetro-spective on tour and a public billboard project.
2021
Jess Dobkin’s Wetrospective Curated by Emelie Chhangur at the Art Gallery of York University (AGYU), Toronto.
2018
TALIXMXN
A series of performances (2018–2019) that invites audiences to gather, assemble, and activate archival materials energetically connected to past and ongoing performances. Iterations of this performance engage the archive of the Hemi-spheric Institute of Performance and Politics, New York City, in collaboration with Jehan Roberson; the Hemispheric Institute’s Encuentro, Mexico City, in collaboration with Laura Levin; and the energetic archive of performances by Shawna Dempsey and Lorri Millan, whose perform-ance archive was lost in a ware-house fire, presented by FADO Performance Art Centre, Toronto.
2017
The Magic Hour
A solo multidisciplinary perfor-mance spell that uses magic to investigate sexual violence, trauma, and transformation. Working with traditions and practices of magic ranging from ancestral sacred charms to top-hat-and-rabbit illusions, it presses the boundaries of public and private, hidden and revealed, to make visible what is not seen. Director Stephen Lawson; Dramaturgs Moe Angelos and Laura Levin; Lighting Design Jennifer Tipton and Michelle Ramsay; Sound Design Richard Feren; Costume Design Atom Cianfarani and Jess Dobkin; Production Management sandra Henderson; Production Assistant Deborah Lim; Consultants Dany Lyne, Beaux Taylor, and Tracy Tidgwell; Dancers Liz Fraser and Levia Rabkin McFarlane; ASL Interpreter Felice Shays. Developed in Residency at The Theatre Centre, Toronto.
Our Future, Our Fate, Our Fortune
Oracle Jess Dobkin, art-spirit guide, invites audiences to a performance art oasis within the larger art fair environment. It is the marketplace flip-side where there is nothing to buy or sell; our currency is energy, our deals are celestial, our contracts are sacred. Fate, fortune, and future are collective concerns, it is time to shift our forecasting from ‘what will happen to me?’ to ‘what will come of us?’ Commissioned and present-ed by Kim Fullerton at Akimbo for Art Toronto.
2015
Acting/Performing/Audience
A three-week project where, in week one, five actors ‘audition’ as actors, performance artists, and audience. In week two, the actors attend the 7A*11D International Performance Art Festival and ‘perform’ as the audience at the festival. In week three, the five actors ‘act’ as performance artists, performing the work from the festival. Co-conspirator Shannon Cochrane with actors William Ellis, Margaret Evans, Shaista Latif, Darwin Lyons, and Jeff Yung. Photography by Tania Anderson. Videography by Chris Behnisch.
How Many Performance Artists Does It Take To Change a Light Bulb (for Martha Wilson)
This performance investigates the definitions and intersections of performance, documentation, archive, image, and reproduction to explore the nature of performance itself. The performance concludes with a special guest appearance by Martha Wilson who changes the light bulb to end the performance. The four-hour durational work was presented at the Enoch Turner Schoolhouse in Toronto.
The Artist-Run Newsstand
A collective of Toronto artists lease a vacant Gateway Newsstand kiosk at the Chester Subway Station, which had been sitting empty for more than six years, to reimagine this commercial space into an alternative newsstand and artists’ space. The newsstand — in operation for one year — commis-sions artist projects that speak to issues of transit, mobility, accessibil-ity, city life, and civic engagement, and address various questions about how news is disseminated and received in a time of rapidly changing technology. The news-stand brings together the work of writers, choreographers, media artists, performance artists, theatre artists, craftspeople, visual artists, and community arts organizers for site-specific exhibitions, screenings, performances, and community arts projects. The newsstand also sells snacks, beverages, artists’ books and multiples, zines, and independent magazines.
MONOMYTHS
Over the course of a year, a diverse collection of artists, scholars, and activists are invited to revise Joseph Campbell’s conception of the hero’s journey through performance art, lectures, workshops, and other offerings. Presented by FADO Performance Art Centre, Toronto. Conceived and co-curated with Shannon Cochrane.
2014
The Performance Art Army
An intervention performed on the sidewalk in front of the Toronto International Art Fair. Dressed as Performance Art Army bell ringers with the style and signifiers of the Salvation Army, Jess Dobkin and Shannon Cochrane collect donations for performance art, the underserved and marginalized art form positioned outside the art market system.
2013
Dirty Plötz
A cabaret turn with a rainbow of enemas.
Free Childcare Provided
A performance art festival hub created for kids that offers talks by participating festival artists, performance-based actions and activities, inspiring conversation, unconventional snacks, and a mediatheque of thought-provoking performance art documentation. At Rapid Pulse International Performance Art Festival in Chicago.
Performance Artist for Hire
Crashing Art Toronto as a walk-about clown, Jess makes her way through the crowds offering free popcorn, cotton candy, and beige ‘sword’ balloons that she inflates on site. She distributes promotional magnets advertising her services as a performance artist, clown, and premier escort for birthday parties, stage shows, and corporate and private events, speaking to the trend of performance art as entertainment at art galas, fundraisers, and fairs.
Power Ball 15 Minutes
Jess attends The Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery’s Power Ball gala naked for fifteen minutes.
2012
Affirmations for Artists
Jess recites affirmations in the women’s washroom at The Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery’s annual Power Ball gala.
Flowers
This performance reimagines Barbra Streisand and Neil Diamond’s hit duet, ‘You Don’t Bring Me Flowers’. First performed in 2010 for a 7A*11D International Perfor-mance Art Festival fundraiser, it was staged again in 2011 at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre where it was filmed by seventeen documenters using cell phones. The footage was then edited into a short film by Jess Dobkin and Stev’nn Hall.
The Artists’ Soup Kitchen
Toronto artists and the wider community are invited to a free hot lunch for six Mondays in the winter of 2012. The project looks at the relationship between art and labour, considers the lineage and history of artists working with food and performance, and responds to a social need, as artists constitute an underserved community whose labour and social contributions often go unrecognized and are undervalued. The Artists’ Soup Kitchen served more than 500 people. In collaboration with Catherine Clarke and Stephanie Springgay.
2011
Bleeding at the Ball
Jess attends the annual Power Ball fundraising gala at The Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery wearing a stained white dress.
Commitment Issues
A curatorial project presenting the work of five artists who use their bodies as the primary source material for investigating qualities and dimensions of commitment — to ideas, performance, audience, and themselves. Conceived and curated with Shannon Cochrane and presented at Oasis Aqualounge, Toronto.
2010
Everything I’ve Got
A solo performance presenting all of Jess’s artistic ideas to an audi-ence, knowing she won’t have time to perform them all before she dies. The performance begins with an experimental lecture format, and as the ideas become more distilled, the physical space breaks down into an ethereal, mysterious, and magical world. Everything I’ve Got was conceived in 2007 after the untimely passing of Jess’s friend, filmmaker Diane Bonder, to ask questions about artistic process and what happens to our ideas that don’t get realized. Presented in 2010 at The Rhubarb Festival, Toronto; EXPERIMENTICA Festival, Chapter Arts Centre, Cardiff, UK; HATCH at Harbourfront Centre, Toronto; The Edgy Women Festival, Montreal; and in 2013 at the University of Michigan. Created with Stephen Lawson, Sherri Hay, Richard Feren, Laird MacDonald, and Laura Baxter.
2009
Mirror Ball
Jess performs as a functional human mirror ball, exploring physical and psychological vulnerabilities, limitations, and boundaries.
2008
Clown Car
A novel interpretation of the traditional circus clown car.
Being Green
Naked in green body paint, Jess performs a lip-sync of Kermit the Frog’s ‘It’s Not Easy Being Green’, accompanied by Lex Vaughn performing as puppeteer Jim Henson.
2006
Fee for Service
Audiences of one are invited to have a pencil sharpened by the artist’s vagina dentata for a nominal fee. Upon entering the gallery, a pencil is purchased from the front desk receptionist who books appoint-ments. When called, the audience participant is invited behind a screen where the private sharpening is negotiated and performed. Upon exiting, the participant is asked to write a message in the guest book with their freshly sharpened pencil.
The Lactation Station Breast Milk Bar
Audiences are invited to ‘quench their curiosity’ by tasting small samples of pasteurized human breast milk, donated by new mothers. The interactive perfor-mance explores cultural issues and taboos surrounding early parent-hood and breastfeeding, and invites a dialogue about intimacy, sexual-ity, morality, biology, taste, and risk. The performance considers breast milk as a substance and symbol that defies boundaries — a bodily fluid, a food, a commodity — complex beyond classification, unregulated, and unruly. Curated by Paul Couillard (Toronto, 2006), Miriam Ginestier (Montreal, 2012) and Natalie Loveless (Edmonton, 2016).
Ear Piece
The artist’s ear pokes through a wall in the Walter Phillips Gallery, Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity. She communicates with visitors by writing notes projected on the opposite wall.
Imagined Family Portraits
An ongoing performance and photographic project where the artist assembles groups of friends and strangers to pose together for studio portraits.
2004
Marry Me
An interactive web-based project where users can marry the artist, customize their own wedding vows, send e-card wedding announcements, and purchase presents for the bride from the artist’s online gift registry.
Restored
Jess takes name-brand clothing from her closet and discreetly re-shelves it at stores of original purchase, inviting consumers to take the items home. Each item has a personalized tag that shares a story about the clothing’s significance and the reason for letting it go. Restored was later presented in Montreal with a small team of artists donating and re-shelving clothes with customized tags. Tag design by Sandra Smith.
The Bookworm
Subversive bookmarks are planted in books on the shelves at mega-bookstores, educating consumers about the troubling business practices of megastores and encouraging them to patronize independent booksellers. Four bookmarks were designed for this action, each one tailored for use in a particular kind of book. Bookmark design by Sandra Smith.
The Confessional
The artist operates a confessional booth with audience participants during Hysteria: A Festival of Women at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre, Toronto. Curated by Festival Director Moynan King.
Emergency Exits
Reflecting on her move from New York to Toronto, the artist offers an autobiographical account of peculiar obsessions and geographical transitions in this hour-long scripted performance. Performed with Simla Civelek.
2003
Attending
Jess is stationed as a ‘full-service’ washroom attendant inside women’s public washrooms, on duty to attend to the needs of women using the facilities. Patrons can ring for service, which might include pussy wiping, tampon insertion, or provision of reading material. Additional services and supplies are offered at the attendant’s cart including towels, lotions, hair products, and breath mints. Presented at Hysteria: A Festival of Women, Toronto; The Kitchen, New York City; Art Toronto (formerly known as The Toronto International Art Fair).
Composite Body
A modified dry-erase board is used in a process of creating a self-constructed body. The artist draws, erases, edits, and re-draws, moving through a spectrum of emotions as she considers the lines and contours of her imagined physique.
An Ontario Bride Seeks American Wives
Soon after Jess moves from New York to Toronto, the province of Ontario legalizes same-sex marriage. In response to this historic legislation, Jess returns to New York to exercise her newly acquired rights, marrying countless people, pets, fire hydrants, and street signs. She conducts more than 50 ceremonies, with accompanying vows, music, confetti, rings, and signed marriage certificates stating the terms of nuptials — including that, ‘if we bump into each other in a movie ticket line, and one of us is way up near the front of the line, we will allow the other person to sneak into the line right next to us, because that’s what married people do for each other’.
Silent Portrait Series
A short silent film of staged performance vignettes.
Six Degrees of Lesbian Nation
A meditation on the inescapable web of lesbian community, this one-woman puppet work humor-ously maps our interconnected lives.
The Two Boobs
With strings tied around nipples and faces painted on breasts, the two boobs become puppets, negotiating the complexities of their relationship in a silent movie-inspired puppet show.
From the Waist Up and Down
One-hour of performance shenanigans at The Rhubarb Festival, Toronto. Curated by Naomi Campbell and performed with Samantha Blanchette, Laura Kim, Simla Civelek, Arun, and Scott White on piano.
2001
Talk to Me
A performance satirizing the use of cell phones in public spaces and the infiltration of modern technology in urban culture. Toting a giant hot pink papier-mâché cell phone, Jess chatters, gossips, and rants her way through New York City. For one presentation at The Kitchen Street Festival, Jess performs as a representative of a fictitious service provider, offering satirical service contracts and cardboard phones.
2000
One Night Only
An exploration of desire and fantasy in the sticky heat of a New York City summer. Performed with Vivian Babuts, Kelly Dolak, Dionne Herbert, Saira, Wazhmah Osman, and Christie White 28 July 2000 at Dixon Place.
The Mad Chef
As The Mad Chef (2000–2003), the artist challenges the confines of role and identity, breaking through internal boundaries in discovery of uncharted territories. Live and video installments have been presented at numerous venues. At the Jack Tilton Gallery in New York, audiences are invited to paint with coloured cake frosting, replicating historical masterpieces and sugar-coating arranged still lives. Cakes become canvases, to be critiqued and then eaten.
1998
Utopia Roaming
Performances and workshops touring to universities, theatres, and community centres in the US and Canada (1998–2001) that explore issues of lesbian identity and community, and encourage audiences to name their dreams and desires as a first step towards realizing them. The initial tour, performed with Eric Cho and Jayne Weber, and supported by the Astraea Foundation and the Franklin Furnace Fund for Performance Art, travelled to sixteen cities in 1998.
1997
The Lesbian Afterlife Carnival Extravaganza
More than a dozen queer performers explore lesbian desire from the ‘Other Side’, envisioning alternate realities as a necessary part of initiating social change and mobilizing collectively. Performed at the WOW Café Theater.
1996
Eat Out: A Lesbian Dinner Theatre Extravaganza
An evening-length performance extravaganza and four-course gourmet dinner featuring larger-than-life puppets and a live cunt-eating contest for dessert at the WOW Café Theater, New York City.
1991
High Tide
Jess’s first one-person show at Oberlin College.
Acknowledgements
I currently live in Tkaronto which for thousands of years has been the traditional territory of many nations including the Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishnabeg, the Chippewa, the Haudenosaunee and the Wendat peoples. It continues to be home to many Indigenous people from across Turtle Island. I am grateful to have the opportunity to live, love, and work on this land.
Project 1
Project 2
Project 3
Project 4
Project 5
Project 6
Project 7
Project 8
Project 9
Project 10
Project 11
Project 12
Project 13
Project 14
Project 15
Project 16
Project 17
Project 18
Project 19
Project 20
Project 21
Project 22
Project 23
Project 24
Project 25
Project 26
Project 27
Project 28
Project 29
Project 30
Project 31
Project 32
Project 33
Project 34
Project 35
Project 36
Project 37
Project 38
Project 39
Project 40
Project 41
Project 42
Project 43
Project 44
Project 45