“We’re crashing your corporate art event, Scotiabank!” said Twyla, Rose and Buttercup, three six-month-old Rhode Island Red/Columbian Rock cross hens who will be “free-ranging” the city’s streets in a manufactured environment during Nuit Blanche. The sisters will hit Nuit Blanche hotspots while housed in a clear, Plexiglas-covered van. The van will provide them with the amenities of home: straw, grass, food, water, free movement, and human company, while posing the question to viewers: “Where should we live?”
As family farmers feel the pinch economically, consumers face rising food costs, the environment is burdened with increasing strain, and animals suffer under the inhumanity of contemporary factory farming methods. In spite of this, numerous cities and municipalities outlaw the raising of backyard hens, as many small-scale urban farmers have discovered. In fact, Twyla, Rose and Buttercup are fugitives. They were ordered removed from their Hamilton, Ontario home last week by the city’s Animal Control division.
Toronto-based multi-disciplinary artist Bryan Belanger enlisted the hens to explore the issues of farmers, agriculture, sustainability and artistic creation, bringing the dialogue up close and personal to the expected one million Nuit Blanche attendees this year. The chicken van will provide food for thought for attendees as they line up for Nuit Blanche events.
The chicken van is part of a multi-installation/multi-event art project undertaken by Belanger, who will further explore the “Where should we live?” question through a week-long interaction with the hens, who will bunk in his studio next week. The art project pays homage to renowned artist Joseph Bueys’ 1974 art action “I Like America and America Likes Me,” whereby the artist lived in a room with a coyote for three days.
“Although one may find it difficult to compare the dangers of living with a coyote compared to a hen, with the threat of H5N1 [avian flu] and Listeria looming… there is no animal more [symbolically] dangerous,” says Belanger.
Belanger is working on a documentary exploring the role of farmers, artists and livestock in contemporary society.
Supervising the chicken van to ensure the wellbeing of the hens is Yuki Hayashi, the Hamilton-based lifestyle journalist who hand-raised the hens from day-old chicks, and was ordered by the City of Hamilton to get rid of them last week.
For more information:
Journalists and photographers requesting interviews or photo opportunities are invited to contact Belanger or Hayashi on our mobile phones throughout the event so we can share location coordinates:
Bryan Belanger: 647-238-1219 - caughtincandy@hotmail.com
Yuki Hayashi: 416-803-9845
No animals will be harmed in the performance of this art interaction.
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