TCB Art Incorporated was a space that was far from wheelchair accessible and didn’t address many other access needs. Its entry was in a steep alley and had a few flights of stairs with no rails in many places and no lift. 

My exhibition was called ‘I’m Not There’ because I could not be there. That was the reason I said ‘yes’ to having a show in that gallery, so I could make a statement about not being there. It was my brother's idea for me to have an exhibition in an inaccessible gallery. 

The idea was very painful to me. So painful that I hadn't thought of it, to have a show in a space I can't physically visit. 

TCB seemed like the most logical place, I had known personally many of the artists who had exhibited there and this was quite heartbreaking. Then they offered me a show, the nerve of them, but ‘hey’, I had the idea ready to go, 

I know now of many more access needs, but it is still so painful. It ain't a party without me.

At first I thought about having nothing in the exhibition, but that felt too obvious. I had put plasticine on the back of blank canvases so that they couldn’t be seen. Denying the gallery goer of ever viewing it.

And behind the last one I had an audio recording of my first rant, the first version of I'm Not A Good Girl, about inaccessibility. I had recorded it in an accessible toilet because I had nowhere else.

It was amazing how many people still asked at the opening, ‘Where is Sam?’ [In the gallery’s Instagram posts about the exhibition, there were reminders that the gallery was not wheelchair accessible.] They simply could not see the lack of access. 

I had them sprinkle yellow glitter all over the floor of the gallery (wee representations). It got everywhere. I like to think that it was the last straw - the glitter. They had been holding on to that place for years, and mine was the last exhibition they showed there.