Christina Battle

In common parlance on social media, posts and tweets lament how the 2020s have seen us sucked into a global quagmire, succumbing to a precarious social economy of death, destruction, and devastation. To fight the bleak outlook of pandemic, war, and environmental degradation, some have turned to practices of communing, healing, and resisting as modes of survival. Christina Battle’s Remedy Toxic Energies: Summoning Circle (2022) invited guests to engage in multiple summoning circles, with the aim of challenging the extractive energies at the heart of Alberta’s economic and cultural ethos. On the day of the first full moon of the new year — January 17, 2022, which coincided with Martin Luther King Day — Battle distributed summoning circle kits with chamomile tea (to drink and smell), beeswax candles (to burn), a seed pack (to plant in the spring), and other instructions to participants. Intertwining New Age notions and traditional medicine, snail mail and the instantaneity of the internet, Battle’s piece spreads out from the artist to foster networks of care and activism. If the internet has gained a reputation as a virtual repository of trash, trolls, and misinformation, it can also carry the seeds of healthy spiritual beliefs and healing interpersonal exchanges. In heavy times / try to remember what it is that you need (2021), Battle transforms two videos from the ongoing series Notes to Self (2020 −) into custom hand-poured palm-wax candles and matchboxes. Whereas the short burning videos in Notes to Self capture simple, repetitive acts of fleeting engagement with social media updates, heavy times translates these ephemeral sequences into concrete objects. Each red-, blue-, orange-, or green-coloured candle reads “HEAVY” or “TIMES,” recasting the popular wellness fad of expensive scented candles into an act of contemplation on the present moment. Instead of gesturing toward some sort of transcendence or sensorial escape, heavy times asks that you consider this difficult juncture and remain committed to navigating it. There is nothing mystical, or even metaphysical, about these objects; rather, they encourage users to focus on trying to “remember what it is that you need” and not what consumer trends, capitalism, or popular influencers have trained them to want, desire, and lust after. Christina BattleNotes to Self, video still, 2014-ongoing.Photo : courtesy of the artist Christina BattleNotes to Self, video still, 2014-ongoing.Photo : courtesy of the artist Christina Battle, Didier Morelli

Christina Battle

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