Apiary Reading, The Life of the Bee, By Maurice Maeterlinck
Performance reading to the bees at the Radical Apiary, Mildred's Lane, Beach Lake, PA (2017)
While at Mildred’s Lane in Beach Lake, PA, I made a performance reading for the honey bees of the Radical Apiary. Sitting in the meadow, close to the entrance of a hive, I read passages from the book The Life of the Bee by Maurice Maeterlinck, written in 1901.
Video still, performance reading for the bees, Maurice Maeterlinck’s The Life of the Bee, written in 1901
Video still, Flight Patterns and The Life of the Bee, Maurice Maeterlinck
“At the present hour the duty before us is to seek out that which perhaps may be hiding behind these sorrows; and, urged on by this endeavor, we must not turn our eyes away, but steadily, fixedly, watch these sorrows and study them, with a courage and interest as keen as though they were joys. It is right that before we judge nature, before we complain, we should at least ask every question that we can possibly ask.”
My gratitude to J. Morgan Puett for entangling me in the ever-evolving community that is Mildred’s Lane. As a graduate student, her work greatly impacted me, particularly the project The Grafter’s Shack which was first installed in the public gardens at Wave Hill in the Bronx, New York. I traveled to Wave Hill searching for this artwork, but it was no longer there. Jennifer McGregor, the curator for over 20 years, generously walked me to the site where it had been located. As the Officer of Complex(ity) at Mildred’s Lane, I slept inside the Grafter’s Shack and helped care for the bees in the apiary. I am grateful for this experience and for my time at Mildred’s Lane.