Sheryl Oring Speaks Out

What I like the most about Sheryl Oring's performance art is that it always involves the audience directly, in fact, it could not be possible without the audience participation that she receives.  Her art makes a bold statement, and it is centered mostly about voices being heard.  Whether through letters to the President or videos on opinions for fixing the country, Sheryl gives her audience the ability to give their opinions on topics that matter. I love the fact that she types her letters on a classic typewriter, because it goes along with the 1960's image that she personifies and it also gives the art a more interesting, less modern feel. My personal favorite art piece of hers is titled "Chain Letter."  This was not so much performance art as it is a sculpture, but it once again allows voices to be heard that otherwise might not have been.  In this case, it is the voices of many Chinese and Yiddish people writing of their reasons for leaving their homelands and coming to America.  Oring types these short explanations on a thin strip of paper and links them together as a chain.  I find it incredible that there is a method to the order in which she linked them; they hung in a pattern that shows the evolution of the Lower East Side/Chinatown neighborhood as these people came to inhabit it.  Overall, Sheryl Oring's work has a clear purpose, and it is beautiful that she has found a way to express herself artistically while also doing a public service to many different communities.