This is a site for ritual. Care Rituals(An Offering), is a culmination of my research and practice in the program. It was developed using my sensibilities of utilizing natural and manmade materials to build toward individual and collective health through care and land/body relationships. I chose the gallery stage to utilize the curtains to envelope the space, creating a mini-ecosystem for my thesis installation, with low lighting and the smell of live plants. Center stage, and the crux of my ideation around this installation, is a fountain. It consists of three major components: a 48”x24”x20” box made of repurposed cedar wood (mimicking a raised garden bed or perhaps a coffin), a 20” television facing upwards and has been partially buried in soil, and the water circuit. Decorating these elements include objects such as rocks, sticks, and additional wood planks that give the planter a sort of set of feet. Playing on the television is a video performance in which a figure in gold cloth interacts with soil and plants. Above the video is the sound focusing speaker playing the video soundtrack of cicadas singing. This focused nature of the speaker's sound is meant to create a moment of disorientation and reorientation to pull the focus of the viewer's body into the space and make it a more embodied experience. Beyond the fountain, and straight ahead, is a mural which depicts a figure. This depicts a drawing of my body in pain from a pain journal I kept during my first semester in the program. The larger-than-life scale places hierarchy on the body. The color is a vibrant magenta/plum color that appears somewhat muddy under the magenta grow lights. The prints pasted to the wall on either side show my body in relation to flora from some of my many walking meditations. The mural and fountain are meant to create a set of bookends for the herbs (basil, lavender, thyme, etc) placed in between. On either side of the stage are gathering areas, which triangulate the space and offer refuge to visitors. Much of my research into care relationships has been within the context of rest, elements, and embodiment. I offer these gathering areas as a space for reflection. I am utilizing elements, such as the dim sound focusing speaker, dim lights, and olfactory stimulation to call the audience intimately into the space. I have made aesthetic choices to avoid specific religious and spiritual references, not to make it secular, but perhaps for something more universal. I do not intend to hide the use of manmade materials. To me, humans and all of our strange byproducts are a part of nature. So instead of trying to hide these (un)natural components, while still holding close to my bias towards elemental beauty, I chose to decorate these objects. This allowed me to do two things. The first is that I was able to follow my intuition as a person of their time; plastic, electronics, and grow lights are all a part of my material and visual language. Second, it lets me hold true to my belief that as we imagine our future together, we should make it irresistibly delicious. We do not have an option of a future without plastic buckets, they’re coming with us - so why not make them beautiful? Website: https://lizhilliard.art/ Instagram: @seedling_liz Tags MCAD MFA MCAD MFA 2024 MFA Thesis 2024