Anna Brody

this is the only thing we’ve got

this is the only thing we’ve got is a suite of videos about what it means to dedicate yourself to love, and to the constant examination of the internalized values that mediate the familial, platonic, and romantic bonds that fill our lives. Using time and performative actions I deal explicitly with the informed, intentional labor involved in communicating love through mutual cooperation and compromise. Through both performance and post production I engage repetition in its capacity to create both comfort and tedium, and to communicate patterning whether healthy or destructive. I think of the actions in all of my videos as the development of muscle memory that helps me to stay flexible and ready to learn what I haven’t yet grasped (or wasn’t ever taught), and unlearn what I need to let go of.

My videos require an investment and faith on the part of the viewer that gesture toward the commitment and conviction required to build love; altruism unseats austerity, abundance overthrows scarcity. The recorded actions show and imagine what devotional care is and can be–embodied explorations of vulnerability, interdependence, sacrifice, endurance, risk, and trust, persisting every day that we wake up and choose it.