Holland Festival: How To Live (After You Die) - Lynette Wallworth
Lynette Wallworth is known for her highly empathetic work that focuses on others, but in HOW TO LIVE (After You Die), the artist tells a story about her own past. She draws on her teenage years of being tempted to join a fundamentalist Christian group to provide a first-hand insight into the appeal of extreme sectarianism. With music by associate artist ANOHNI, among others.
Holland Festival: How To Live (After You Die) - Lynette Wallworth
Entangled in a belief system
As outlandish conspiracy theories like QAnon gripped millions around the world, Wallworth saw a chapter from her past creep into the present. During his presidency, Donald Trump took advice from a team of charismatic self-proclaimed prophets, the Evangelical Advisory Board, and because the artist herself had once played the role of a "prophet" in her own community, she decided the time had come to to tell her story.
In this work, Wallworth takes her listeners through the trap of a young woman who becomes entangled in a divisive and polarizing belief system. HOW TO LIVE (After You Die) gives a voice to an artist in the prime of her life. At the same time, it points to the plethora of extremist influences that can manipulate and shape us unless we find our way back to our own story. Other work by Wallworth will also be on display during the festival.
'As an artist, imagination is my religion, but along the way I encountered other religions. Some of them I devoted myself to and I hit the rocks. (...) I completely handed over my responsibility to a divine roulette wheel that made every decision for me and it didn't end well…'
− Lynette Wallworth