Downtown Minneapolis
Black Friday
November 2002

“I am looking for people who are interested in some public art action ….pushing and dancing in shopping carts in supermarkets & department stores in Minneapolis on Friday November 29th for Buy Nothing Day. Lets fill our carts with art or nothing! Lets create art instead of shopping and give it away for free!”

We threw ourselves a bunch of challenges today…something I see much more clearly than four years ago. Dancing with a new group of people for the first time, inside department stores, attempting simultaneously to engage the public with our art and ideas without preaching and engage ourselves and each other in our dancing play. Not an easy task, especially when store security asks you to stop dancing, stop solicting your upcoming show, we were handing out flyers that said “The more you consume, the less you live”. At Target security stated that “Unless you shop you will have to leave the premises.” My dictionary states to shop is as much about the examining as it is the purchasing of specific goods. Examining and investigating is not a skill we lack…seeing these stores as museums of culture.

And once again it seemed it was fine for the children to dance to the live music that was being played in the foyer, but for an adult or a young athletic male….

For me the most exciting moments were when I was able to switch between dancing with others, moving through the space and talking with people about Buy Nothing Day, so that all these elements of interacting with people and the space and sharing my ideas around consumerism, fear and greed on this national day of shopping became part of my dancing score, in the freedom of the cold windy blustery street.

Performers: Amy Behm, Josie Winship, KC Somdahl, Olive Bieringa, Otto Ramstad, Sally Rouse

To find out more about the international annual event Buy Nothing Day visit Adusters