Jessica Grable, 2011
The Self-Preservation Series With Jessica Grable
The Self-Esteem Salon
In 1997, working under the name of his alter-ego Cheri Nevers, Chris Verene began a series of performance art pieces called "Self-Esteem Salons," which sought to create a safe space for people to live out a fantasy scene, while performing self-esteem-raising actions before the camera. "The Self-Esteem Salon" is a performance artwork wherein artist Chris Verene and a growing family of artists, known as "Group Facilitators," build a temporary sanctuary, used in helping strangers, called "clients," to make a sincere and lasting change in their lives. The performance offers a variety of public and private experiences including cognitive therapy, massage (touch and non-touch), costume construction, audio therapy, and other activities that the artist has found effective in elevating clients’ self-esteem over the past twenty-one years of practice. The project is something like a "day spa" — a short time spent in therapy that will have positive results on one's personal life.
Several of the "Salon's" staff members began working on the piece as teenagers, and have grown to adulthood while participating in the work. The experience must be seen to be believed. Some compare it to going to a church, others say it was like a family reunion, still others say it was like going to a very modest orgy. All descriptions are true, as the performers carefully structure the client’s experience around what they believe they need at that moment in the client’s life.