Frances McDormand on her adult-sized cradle art project: It's not performative, it's experiential'

"A small-town police chief of plainspoken decency in Fargo. A working-class mother driven to seek justice for her daughter in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri. A modest, resilient woman finding dignity in life on the road in Nomadland. The actor Frances McDormand's three Oscar-winning performances display rare versatility but have empathy at their core. But qualities were on display last week when she joined the conceptual artist Suzanne Bocanegra at the opening of an exhibition featuring adult-sized cradles."

"McDormand's and Bocanegra's were the hands that rocked the cradle of Nancy Buchanan, 79, and 94-year-old Barbara T Smith, two doyennes of the Los Angeles art scene before Shaker lemon pie was served at Cradled, an exhibition inspired by the Shakers, a Christian sect formally known as the United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing. The Shakers are best known for their simple, communal lifestyle and ecstatic worship that included dancing and shaking (hence the name)."

"Cradled, at the Hauser & Wirth Downtown Los Angeles gallery, highlights how the Shakers, who embraced celibacy and often sheltered more elders than children, developed a culture of end-of-life care. Here's a community where you are saved all the possessiveness, jealousy, enviousness all the things that come along with carnal relations between men and women, men and men, women and women, McDormand says from New York in a group Zoom call."

Frances McDormand, celebrated for diverse Oscar-winning roles, attended the opening of Cradled alongside conceptual artist Suzanne Bocanegra. The exhibition featured adult-sized cradles and honored Nancy Buchanan and Barbara T Smith, elder figures in the Los Angeles art scene. Cradled drew inspiration from the Shakers, formally the United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing, who practiced communal living, ecstatic worship, and celibacy. The Shakers developed a culture of end-of-life care and often sheltered more elders than children. The last active Shaker community now resides at Sabbath Day Lake, Maine, with three members. A new film, The Testament of Ann Lee, renewed attention to Shaker history.

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