In the summer of 2018, the artist began Part One of a ten-day self-appointed artist residency on the streets of Times Square. Playing spy and citizen journalist, she wandered into unlocked buildings, eavesdropped on tourists, opened the stage door to Waitress The Musical, sang with a street entertainer, drank at the last remaining neighborhood dive bar, received reiki on a public bench, performed a daily greeting ritual with a network of public surveillance cameras, and followed an investigative rabbit hole that led to seeing to the worst and longest running Off-Broadway play of all time. The ten videos in this exhibit are the real-time documentation of these adventures, as shared on Instagram Stories. Part Two of this project will begin in Summer 2019. You can follow along @jennifervanilla.
 

Jennifer Vanilla is the entrepreneurial fantasy vessel LARPed (Live Action Role Played) into reality by Becca Kauffman, a New York City performance artist and long standing member of the musical group, Ava Luna. Her work is rooted in social practice, live experimentation, humor, and interaction-based decision making, all via the viewpoint of the benevolently self-absorbed, yet relatable, fictional identity, Jennifer Vanilla. An encapsulation of court jester, faithful emcee, righteous boss, and ingenue with Big Apple dreams, the many faces of Jennifer Vanilla lend her the instant familiarity of a celebrity with Big Diva Energy.

Genre-fluid by design, Jennifer Vanilla appears in art, music, theater, comedy, and pedestrian environments, including but not limited to MoMA PS1, Museum of Modern Art, Bruce High Quality Foundation, Bowery Ballroom, Revolve Gallery, public parks, natural landscapes, and, as seen in this exhibit, the surveillance cameras of Times Square. J.V. has toured coast to coast as a musical performance act sharing stages with Carrie Brownstein (Sleater-Kinney), Cindy Wilson (The B-52's), Miho Hatori (Cibo Matto), Yaeji, YACHT, Dynasty Handbag, David Liebe Hart, & more. Her debut album of jv edits, This is Jennifer, was Cassette of the Month at Rough Trade Records in Brooklyn, April 2018, and her original program, The Jennifer Vanilla Hour, airs monthly on Queens Public Television.

Jennifer Vanilla performs at Ad-Verse Fest in Athens, GA on March 2, 2019.

This exhibit is curated by Photography Fellow Forest Kelley and will be on view in the Photography Area through February 8, 2019.