Virginia Overton in "Emergency Cheesecake" at the Whitney

Virginia Overton, in "Emergency Cheesecake," organized by Wade Guyton and Jay Sanders at the Whitney Museum, New York, November 30, 2012. Video: 16 Miles [more].

The tension grew quickly during Virginia Overton's performance on November 30 in the lower-level courtyard of the Whitney Museum as part of the one-night-only "Emergency Cheesecake" event organized by Wade Guyton and Jay Sanders. She stood on a little raised stage, just a few yards from where John Knight installed Curb Appeal (1966/2012)—his mysterious hood and rain chain—along the Breuer Building's bridge during the Whitney Biennial earlier in the year. Wild country music, a wailing fiddle, played in the glassed-in space as the crowd watched. Overton plugged electrical cords into a Vlasic pickle, and presented her handiwork to the crowd. Nothing happened. She looked a little bit embarrassed, not sure what to do. Overton, a master of tough, hyper-minimal, and slyly humorous work, was turning herself into a circus clown, performing—failing to perform—for a packed house. Pretty endearing, terrifying stuff. The song reset. What were we waiting for? But then the magic arrived.