FROM CHAKRAS TO GLANDS

FOR THE UCC SHOW: FROM CHAKRAS TO GLANDS

FROM CHAKRAS TO GLANDS

WITH VISUALS FROM PAST PERFORMANCES; EPHEMERA FROM 14 YEARS OF LIVING ART ; VISITATIONS WITH MOTHER TERESA


CHAKRAS

1984 I began a performance titled 14 YEARS OF LIVING ART, 1984-1998, an endurance based on the 7 chakras of the body. I knew about Chakras because my teacher, Dr. Ramamurti Mishra (Shri Brahmananda Saraswati) founder of ANANDA ASHRAM, Monroe NY, introduced his meditation community to this incredibly ancient and compelling way of seeing and being light/ecstasy and as an artist I was compelled to performatively explore his teachings; so for 14 years I wore one color clothing each of the 14 years and performed other self -imposed sonic/visual/psychological/sensate disciplines designed to aesthetically shake me out of the trance of my daily life traumas. Immersed in Mysticism, the Hindu Way, I was totally dedicated to the Chakras, was "ordained " as a sanyasin, studied Indian raga, received a grant to research the burning ghats in Benares and merged so completely that I was even symbolically "adopted" by a Guajarati couple, Dr. AL Mehta & Dr. Aruna Mehta, both Ayruvedic physicians, living for a total of 30 some years as if I were born in India.



GLANDS

1998 I began DAD ART, 1998-2005 a seven year LIFE-ART opportunity which allowed me to spend time with my father, Henry Montano. Living in his world, it was as if I was re-adopted back into being a Saugertiesian, an Italian-Irish Roman Catholic, a daughter of first generation immigrants and I developed new personas/thinkings to fit the geography and site. Armed Theologically with 30 years of unimaginable wisdom of the East, I ventured back into the Church of my youth sometimes kicking, sometimes screaming, but Transubstantially glad to be home. All was de-constructed, re-mixed and in the translation and mask changing, I began speaking a new language, dropping the word "Chakra" from my research and adding the more generic "Gland" because I noticed that everything, at least in my now Roman Catholic conscience, was an opportunity for friction and fight. (We all have glands , not everyone would agree that we have Chakras.) To avoid being labeled "new age" I decided to fit in and become as extraordinarily ordinary as possible but then was pulled out of my hiding after being diagnosed with a movement disorder which bent me over, and so I began performing and acting out as Mother Teresa of Calcutta. As a result, in 2008, The Hindu-Catholic Way was born!