For this annual summer event in Portland, I created a still act on the lawn of the performance venue. There, a sprinkler clicked and a man in a lawn chair slept with a can of beer in his hand. A mother in a party dress held a birthday cake in her outstretched arms. And the beer was spilling. And men hummed on a porch and candles burned on the cake. And a woman reclined on a blanket with balloons in her hand. And a girl in a wading pool cradled a houseplant. 

And the sprinkler soaked the man who was sleeping. And lawn torches blazed. And the cake slipped from the mother’s hands and an overturned television showed a woman tied to a chair. And she was shouting. And a blindfolded man held a pin on a tail near a picture of a donkey on a tree trunk. And someone passing on the sidewalk held a melting ice cream cone. And a rogue figure was caught in the headlights, clutching a suitcase.

Photos by Scott Jackson.