THE CAGE 1998

Streets of Paris and Galerie Arbaca. Paris 1998

I put a man in a cage with wheels and pushed him from Gallery Arbaca in Les Halles to Centre Pompidou in Paris, I sat down in a café and had a coffee and a cigarette while the man remained in the cage in front of me. People approached him, spoke to him, fed him and some even tried unsuccessfully to let him out. I continued my walk followed by a large crowd of people: some curious, others very angry and aggressive. One woman even flung her cigarette butt at me, yelling “I was crazy, I should be institutionalized, how could I put a man in a cage!”. I was eventually stopped by the police, the man was forced out of the cage even though he wanted to remain in it and I was taken to the Commissariat where I was made to sign a document that stated “I would not encage anyone else in public because France is a Republic and it is against the law”. I pushed my empty cage back to the gallery and caged myself. I wore high heels during the whole performance.