Excerpt from Unna Bettie’s performance at the Mystery Spot.

Laying naked on the ground, Unna Bettie’s hair was woven into thick braids of long grasses growing out of the ground, into which were woven flowers. As she lay, a group of women harvested flowers from a nearby field and decorated her hair. Using knives and machetes, she was hacked free from the grass and doused herself in colored liquid from a zinc tub buried in the ground. Following a rope dipped at points in milky liquid, she collapsed in a heap on a thatched pine bed, next to a watermelon, a stalk of grass propped up against her. 

She stayed, and didn’t move even when a giant cricket crawled onto her. That’s dedication to craft.

video by Jonatan Lopez