When I Was a Monster

A performance about the artist’s experience in the aftermath of an accident.

“While When I Was a Monster conveys McGuire’s feelings about her own body after falling off a cliff, it also articulates the universal lack of satisfaction women feel when contemplating their physical selves, and encapsulates another part of McGuire’s project: the demonstration of the performative, grotesque aspects of femininity. … Though she appears to be in pain, our sympathy hasn’t been solicited, and the fact that we can observe such a private examination feels like an intrusion … McGuire confronts the audience with her weakened, disfigured body and reminds us of our own fragility.”

—Nicole Armour, “Alternate States,” Film Comment (July/August 2000)

This title is also available on Anne McGuire Videoworks: Volume 1 and American Psycho(drama): Sigmund Freud vs. Henry Ford.