I was heading home from Victoria, B.C. last Sunday after a weekend doing standup at Hecklers (yes, that’s the actual name of a comedy club and no, don’t be one) when I bumped into Amy-Ellen Flatchestedmama Trefsger (also an actual name) in the waiting room for the Seattle-bound Clipper. Trefsger makes art under her memorable middle moniker, which she legally changed in 2004 as part a “Public Declaration of Commitment to Her Creative Self.” She was also returning from a weekend abroad.
“Look at this,” she said, opening her passport, “I honestly forgot that was in there.” In all caps beside her photo was the nom d’art:
There’s something undeniably satisfying about this act of artistic caprice in the stern bureaucratic context of an international travel document. This is what Trefsger does; her practice integrates creativity into daily life. In addition to the name change and its Commitment Ceremony where she made vows to her own creativity, she’s spent a month wearing nothing but grey clothes and lived for nine days in the stationary boat at Country Village, a folksy-themed shopping center in Bothell. Her work is personal, confoundingly simple and reassuringly human-scaled. It’s also very funny. [Check out my last foray into humor in art.]
I asked Trefsger about her most recent project, #Seward Star Walking, a month-long performance piece in which she gave herself a gold star each day for walking around Seward Park in April. The stars went on a calendar/sandwich board she wore:
“My artwork is about the art/life continuum, and in my life I need exercise, so I was like, ‘How can I make that into an art piece?’”
In addition to rewarding herself with a gold star, Trefsger ended up handing them out to other walkers.
“One 88-year-old woman was like, ‘What’s this?’ I told her and she said, ‘I walk every day and no one gives me a gold star!’ so I was like, ‘Let me give you one!’ I saw her a few times.”
“Everyone loves getting a gold star,” Trefsger says, “I gave out a lot. Normally I walked alone because I felt that was the best way to engage with people. I didn’t have a camera crew following—it’s just me, looking kinda strange—so that people would feel free to engage. I’d say ‘Do you need a gold star today for getting your exercise?’”
She burned through her first batch of 250 and had to buy 300 more, awarding as many as 30 on a particularly pleasant weekend day. Unfortunately, less than halfway through the month some old double dutch jump roping injuries flared up (Trefsger spent seven years as part of OnTheDouble, an all-girl adult double dutch crew) and she was unable to continue.
“I got really motivated by the gold stars. When I was in it I was like, ‘This is the best idea ever! It’s so relaxing and Seward Park is gorgeous!’ I was walking every day and then my calf muscle just freaked out. It hurt to the touch of my pant leg; it was bad. I was heartbroken because I was having so much fun.”
Turning to social media, she enlisted the help of five friends, lining up “stand-ins” to cover her walks. [Nicole Stellner, left, in the home stretch.] The work took on a different character.
“For me, personally, asking for help is hard,” she says, “But asking for help is good. Choreographers dance in their own works and then they get to a point where they start using other people and just become the choreographer. I had that mind-shift of other people doing my piece. I don’t know if I’ll use that in the future, but it was a good conceptual opening for me.”
The stand-ins finished out the month. Trefsger’s now back in physical therapy for her re-injured leg, a casualty of the art/life continuum. Nevertheless, she’s happy about how the piece turned out and the insights it’s given her.
“All artwork is follow-through. Everybody’s an artist, but if you have an idea you’ve got to follow through; that’s what makes you a practicing artist. Even I consider [#Seward Star Walking] to be a smaller piece, but I did it. I followed through and that’s the important thing.”
As we got ready to board the Clipper I remarked that I, too, was proud of myself: that weekend I had walked the two miles from the comedy club to the Clipper dock with luggage, both ways. Mostly it was because I was too cheap to turn off airplane mode on my phone and get pinged with an international call for a cab, but still: four miles in a weekend is not bad for a hungover guy with flat feet.
“Do you want a gold star?”
All photos courtesy Amy-Ellen Flatchestedmama Trefsger except the last one.