WESTERN FRONT – Performance by Katayoon Yousefbigloo

Description:

At the opening reception of Wishing on My Falsies, exhibiting artist Katayoon Yousefbigloo activated the five-sided structure of her installation Kiosk (2025) as a performance platform. To begin, Yousefbigloo scrolled online shopping platforms on her phone to disrupt the signal from her electric guitar. This interference was looped and modified using effects pedals, and later layered with sounds generated by scratching lottery tickets. The live score accompanied a sequence of folding, tagging, and stacking screen-printed garments—including t-shirts, socks, and accessories—multiples of which were featured in the installation. The sound and choreography expanded on Yousefbigloo’s ongoing interest in the relationship between repetition and distortion, and the ritual experience of retail environments.

Katayoon Yousefbigloo reaches over a glass counter covered by guitar pedals to grab a pile of TS cables. She wears a white dress shirt with text reading FETISH FETISH printed in black near its collar. Another white dress shirt with a large block of black text printed on its front is hung on a black clothes hanger and affixed to the white wall behind her via two pieces of blue painters tape.

Katayoon Yousefbigloo holds a red electric guitar above a glass countertop covered with guitar pedals as if positioning the guitar to lie it down. A white dress shirt hanging from a black hanger is taped to the white wall behind her via blue painters tape. To her side, a person wearing an orange head scarf looks intently at the countertop beneath the guitar.

Katayoon Yousefbigloo leans over a red electric guitar resting on a glass countertop. She holds a smartphone displaying an illustration of an eye on top of the guitar strings with one hand and points her index finger at the smartphone screen with another. An onlooking crowd stands to her side in the gallery space. Behind the crowd is an image-covered wall depicting an extreme close-up of a person wearing gold eyeshadow and glossy red lipstick.

Katayoon Yousefbigloo stands behind a counter covered by guitar pedals connected to a red electric guitar. She looks downwards at a knob she adjusts on one of the guitar pedals. The crowd that fills the gallery space to her side follows her line of sight towards the pedal.

Katayoon Yousefbigloo flattens a pile of blue and white T-shirts against a glass countertop with her hands. The counter is C-shaped and its other side is covered by guitar pedals and a metal signage stand. The top of the metal stand is an empty rectangle that frames part of the white dress shirt hanging behind the counter against the white wall of the gallery.

Katayoon Yousefbigloo holds the neckline of a grey T-shirt as she reaches a hand inside the collar. The grey T-shirt sits atop a pile of white and blue shirts resting on a glass countertop. The grey T-shirt has partially visible black text that reads FETIS, resembling the text printed on the white dress shirt worn by Yousefbigloo that reads FETISH FETISH near its pointed collar.

Katayoon Yousefbigloo folds a grey T-shirt widthwise into a long, narrow shape on top of a glass counter, leaving the bottom of the shirt draping off the counters edge. Although partially obstructed by the folds in the fabric, vertical text printed on the arm sleeve and pant leg of Yousefbigloos outfit reads AUTONOMY, AUTO, AUT, and AUTONOM. Four people lean against a wall to her side with gazes fixed on the glass countertop.

Katayoon Yousefbigloo crosses her hands over a red electric guitar and a row of connected guitar pedals resting on a glass counter. She adjusts a knob on the pedal nearest the guitars base while scratching a lottery scratch card that rests on the guitar strings.

Katayoon Yousefbigloo holds two metal signage stands over a red electric guitar connected to a row of guitar pedals. A smartphone rests on the guitars base and a lottery scratch card rests on its strings. The signage stands have round, reflective bases that attract the gaze of the crowd to her side and Yousefbigloo herself.

Captions:

Performance by Katayoon Yousefbigloo, video documentation, Jan 11, 2025. 19 min. 15 sec. Camera by Qiuli Wu.
Katayoon Yousefbigloo performing at Western Front, photo documentation, Jan 11, 2025. Photo by Dennis Ha.
Katayoon Yousefbigloo performing at Western Front, photo documentation, Jan 11, 2025. Photo by Dennis Ha.
Katayoon Yousefbigloo performing at Western Front, photo documentation, Jan 11, 2025. Photo by Dennis Ha.
Katayoon Yousefbigloo performing at Western Front, photo documentation, Jan 11, 2025. Photo by Dennis Ha.
Katayoon Yousefbigloo performing at Western Front, photo documentation, Jan 11, 2025. Photo by Dennis Ha.
Katayoon Yousefbigloo performing at Western Front, photo documentation, Jan 11, 2025. Photo by Dennis Ha.
Katayoon Yousefbigloo performing at Western Front, photo documentation, Jan 11, 2025. Photo by Dennis Ha.
Katayoon Yousefbigloo performing at Western Front, photo documentation, Jan 11, 2025. Photo by Dennis Ha.
Katayoon Yousefbigloo performing at Western Front, photo documentation, Jan 11, 2025. Photo by Dennis Ha.

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Western Front is a non-profit artist-run centre in Vancouver.

We acknowledge the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and səl̓ílwətaʔɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations as traditional owners of the land upon which Western Front stands.