Butterfly

Location: Studio Kura, Fukuoka, Japan

Duration: 1 hour

In this one-hour performance, Conway stands barefoot in a quiet Japanese garden at the edge of a forest. In their hand is a dead butterfly, found earlier while cycling—falling suddenly from the sky and landing in their path. Conway stopped, lifted it gently from the ground, and carried it to this place. Around them, insects create a steady, living soundtrack.

Conway wears a Hawaiian shirt whose pattern resembles wings, but not quite. This slight confusion between imitation and reality reflects how humans attempt—and often fail—to come close to other forms of life. While gazing at the butterfly, Conway slowly flutters their eyelids, a restrained gesture that alludes to the movement the insect once had.

Audience members may enter or leave at any time. Their arrivals and departures become part of the work, emphasizing the brief and shifting nature of attention. The performance does not seek to save, explain, or resolve. Instead, it holds a moment of loss with care, drawing on Simone Weil’s notion of attention as an act of looking without grasping.

Through the convergence of garden, forest, and stillness, the work creates a space to witness something small and final, and to sense the fragility of one’s own presence alongside it.