Life of a Craphead (Amy Lam and Jon McCurley)
Formed in Toronto in 2006, Life of a Craphead is a collaborative project that originates from a live comedy routine by the Hong Kong–born Amy Lam and Jon McCurley, who is of Vietnamese and Irish heritage. Working in performance, video, installation, and public interventions, they humorously call attention to instances of racism and prejudice that occur on a microscopic scale in everyday life, while also broadening their critique to topics such as colonial history and the socioeconomic conditions for art. In 2013, they held a solo exhibition at the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, and from 2012 to 2017 they organized and hosted Doored, an online performance art series that featured some 120 artists.
King Edward VII Statue Floating Down the Don, 2017, replica of colonial statue in Toronto’s Queen’s park, painted on styrofoam, resin, epoxy, wax, wood. Commissioned by Don Valley River Park Art Program. Courtesy of the artist. Photo: Chris Helgren (Reuters).
View of performance art show Doo red, Toronto Biennial of Art, 2019. Courtesy of the artist. Photo: Yuula Benivolski.
Bugs, 2016, HD video, color, sound, 72 min. Courtesy of the artist.