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Jeff Byrd Holy Ghost 'Holy Ghost' is a piece that relates to my childhood in rural Alabama. Jesus was everywhere and for a little boy that was a rather scary thing. The rough dissonance of Southern voices in song seemed to tap into a world beyond the corporeal. This piece is ultimately a plea for forgiveness. The question is who is meant to hear the plea? While I have left behind many aspects of the belief system of my heritage, the language still remains. The debt must still be paid whether the transgressions are personal or global. While my work is often based on specific autobiographical information, the results are often open-ended and ambiguous. I invite the interpretations of others and often think they are as valid as my own. Jeffery Byrd is a photographer and performance artist whose work has been widely shown throughout the US. He has had solo exhibitions in New York, Minneapolis, Philadelphia and Portland. He has performed at Lincoln Center, DCTV, Greenwich House and the Alternative Museum in New York, Chicago's N.A.M.E gallery, Boston¹s Institute for Contemporary Art, Full Nelson in Los Angeles, the Cleveland International Performance Art Festival and the Indianapolis Installation Festival. Byrd¹s elegantly minimal art explores the metaphoric potential of the human body through video, movement, original music and otherworldly vocals. Born and raised in Alabama, much of his work connects the spiritual with the physical translates autobiography into symbolic actions. |
