The Séance, 2023

Made during Robinson’s residency at Zuecca Projects in Venice, The Séance was staged in memory of his father, Phil Robinson (1951–2021). An invited medium leads Robinson and other participants around a candlelit table scattered with roses. They wear tall paper masks bearing isolated eyes, noses, and mouths, concealing their faces while turning them into strangely incomplete figures.

As the group leans over the table, the attempt to reach the dead is treated in earnest. When no presence answers, Robinson removes his mask and says, “This isn’t working.” The medium leaves her place, confronts him, and slaps him for failing to take the séance seriously. The slap was not staged, and the performance was abandoned.

The only unequivocal contact produced by the séance is between the living. Grief, belief, and doubt cease to be subjects of the work and become forces acting inside it. Robinson later carried the failed ceremony into a series of paintings, preserving the moment when the structure he had made broke and something beyond his control entered.