Putting the WILD back into the West: starring Belle Sauvage & Buffalo Boy
Lori Blondeau and Adrian StimsonOctober 19, 2006 8PM
All will not be quiet at the Western Front when Belle Sauvage & Buffalo Boy ride into town. For one night only, Vancouver audiences are invited to witness and participate in a performative photo-op with the renowned and notorious multi-spirited plains duo.
Belle Sauvage & Buffalo Boy are performance personas created by artists Lori Blondeau and Adrian Stimson, investigating the impact of colonization on traditional and contemporary aboriginal culture. Blondeau’s Belle Sauvage is loosely based on Indigenous women who performed in Wild West shows and Vaudeville acts in the early 20th century, and also spoofs the 1950s film Calamity Jane, in which Doris Day performed as a cross-dressing, gender-bending white cowgirl. Buffalo Boy, a character parody of Buffalo Bill, is part of Stimson’s ongoing series of performances and exhibitions (including such works as Buffalo Boy’s Wild West Peep Show, Buffalo Boy Getting it from 4 directions, and Buffalo Boy’s Heart On) that re-signify colonial history.
For Putting the WILD back into the West: starring Belle Sauvage & Buffalo Boy, Blondeau and Stimson will set up a ‘Wild West’ diorama, and invite audience members to join them within it for a photo session, creating a scene where artists and viewers become co-participants in creating meaning and history.