Bill Burns: The Salt, the Oil, the Milk

Bill Burns’ project is in two parts. The first is an exhibition and the second is a performance. 

The Salt, the Oil, the Milk is an exhibition of notes, drawings, paper models as well as documents and pre-documents. It is on show at MKG127 in Toronto until October 9. More information about the exhibition can be found at mkg127.com.

The live performance at the Oculus pavilion is called The Salt, the Donkey, the Goats, the Milk, the Honey.

There will be a trip of goats. There will be a donkey. There will be a brass band. There will be a bag of salt, a bee-keeper, a jar of honey, an MC and a centrifuge. Bill Burns’ trading odyssey, from the Swiss Alps to Egypt, Patagonia, and Central China, continues. The Salt, the Donkey, the Goats, the Milk, the Honey will unfold at the Oculus Pavilion in Toronto on Friday, October 8, 2021, from 1 to 4pm. (rain date: October 15, 2021). The performance includes a procession of musicians, goats, farmers, beekeepers and a donkey who carries the salt. The musicians will play songs about milk, honey, donkeys, container ships and campfires. At the end of the day, Bill will mix the milk and honey and salt together. He calls this “The Mixing of Milk and Honey and Salt.”

Bill began his long-duration performance, otherwise called The Great Donkey Walk or The Great Trade at Amden Switzerland, in September 2018. With the help of two donkeys, he carried salt from the local salt mine up some gentle slopes in the Swiss Alps. On the way up the mountain, he traded some salt for apples at the orchard, then he traded apples for honey at the beekeeper’s house. At the top of the mountain, he served apples drizzled with honey and a pinch of salt.

Bill Burns’ long-duration performance is part of a seven-year cycle. First Burns acquires a load of salt in China. It is hauled by sea and rail to the Port of Vancouver and onward to Newfoundland. He trades the salt for a trip of goats (perhaps three or four). He sets off from Newfoundland by sea via Liverpool to Greece, then Egypt, followed by Lebanon, Georgia, Turkey and Slovenia before returning to Canada via New York. In each instance, Burns deploys a different conveyance to move or trade dry goods, foodstuffs, or livestock. It goes like this: After the business of arranging and transporting the trip of goats from Canada to Greece via England he trades them for a load of raw honey. By and by, he departs Greece, with a vacuum-sealed container load of honey, bound for Egypt. Upon receiving his moorage assignment at Alexandria, he haggles for several days, finally reaching a deal for an exchange of honey for base metal.  And on it goes. Bill suggests that there will be reversals, even failures. 

Performance location
The performance is at The Oculus Pavilion on the Humber River Recreational Trail. Trail access: Stephen Drive and Cloverhill Road, Toronto, Canada M8Y 1T2.

Generously funded by: The Canada Council for the Arts, The Ontario Arts Council and Alfred Richterich Stiftung

Project sponsor: ARTWORXTO

Producer: Carrie Perreault

Bill Burns’ work about animals and advanced industry has been featured in solo exhibitions, publications and performances at the ICA, London, the KW, Berlin and MOCA, Toronto, and in group shows at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, Seoul Museum of Art, Arnolfini, Bristol and the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam.