click image above to view installation footage and excerpt of video
Waiting for ( ) uses as its starting point Samuel Beckett's play "Waiting for Godot." Beckett's play takes place on the edge of a forest by a sickly looking tree. Two tramps are standing by the tree waiting for M. Godot. For the duration of the play, they quarrel, make up, contemplate suicide, try to sleep and eat. In the last scene, one asks the other "Well? Shall we go?" The response is "Yes, let's go." However, neither one moves. Their lack of action infuses the play with a sense of despair and in the end the curtain descends on their immobility. "Watiting for Godot" is ultimately about the act of waiting - waiting for something that doesn't ever happen.
Julia Page pairs the script from the last act of Beckett's play with C-span coverage of the Iraq war debates in the Senate. Using video footage of the debates and pulling out the words from the script, Page has created her own absurd play. Through this provocative combination, she silently questions the validity of the debate and the lack of consensus or action among politicians. The American public continues to wait and watch while the debate goes around in circles, with our political leaders stuck in a state of immobility. (Cathy Kimball, ICA San Josa, CA)