Dimensions: Plaster body cast 170cm tall; resin body cast 170 cm tall
Date of the work: 2010 Medium: Plaster, lace, and resin
Exhibition history: Deception (2010); Trasparenza (2022)
Condition of the work: remains held in a bespoke plexiglass box from 2022, exhibited as Ġilda.
A Dazzle Escape was one of six works in a collective exhibition by emerging women artists, curated by Christine X at a private building on Valletta’s Lascaris Wharf between February and March 2010 under the title Deception.
Tabone chose to focus on the idea of disguising your own appearance to give the impression of being someone or something else. It is a performative work that does not engage conventional live art, aiming to deceive the beholder into overlooking her escape. She presents herself as a full-size plaster cast clad in what appears to be a wedding veil and a long lacey train. A distraction to divert attention from the truth, embodied in the other full-body cast in resin at the foot of the life-size plaster cast. While A Dazzle Escape can be seen as an escape from reality, the artist also presents this as a possibility for herself to escape from lies and betrayal, deceiving her deceivers. This is particularly evident in the imagery derived from the shedding of one’s skin, similar to what snakes, lizards, and amphibians are commonly known to do regularly whenever they outgrow their skin. This is Tabone’s symbolic metamorphosis from adolescence into adulthood as she seeks to assert her personal identity within her milieu.
The remains of the resin cast have been kept in the artist’s collection. It was exhibited in a transparent plexiglass box under the title Ġilda during the 2022 exhibition Trasparenza.
