is anybody out there? was a collaboration between Liz Oakley and Ali Goss that took place in spring 2020, at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic in New York City.

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The project was a series centered around an evolving installation set on our fire escape facing the neighboring brownstones’ courtyards. Over time, the text and performing object installation attempted to communicate with the households that we saw daily from our window — but never talked to — with the eventual goal of collaborating on a live puppetry performance (which, sadly, never occurred).

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Every few days, we added increasingly direct statements and questions to our initial transmission: “Hello Neighbors, Happy Spring!” The resulting video is a document of the installation of simple textual elements made of the cardboard we had lying around. In recording and sharing our process, with all of its experiments, setbacks, and successes, we aimed to honor and record the specificity, mundanity, and discovery within our attempt to maintain a daily practice as makers during the pandemic.

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This video appeared as part of the "19 Acts of Covid Bravery" digital performance gallery, curated by Brendan Drake and Kate Ladenheim.