"Our life cycle is engineered so we do what we do – we make a mess – and then we die. We’re told how to take care of ourselves but we do what we want, and the inevitable happens. So, while it’s clear we’re wrecking our global ecosystem, we unheedingly charge ahead, but the stakes are different. Either we don’t understand or just don’t care.

Which suggests that we are projecting our own mortality onto the earth. The end of the precarious balance between humanity and nature is like the loss of a mind. The end of humans on earth and the end of my life might be tied together in a dance macabre – a ritual of co-dependency whose climax is a duet of death.

As I thought about why we are SO self-destructive, I found myself remembering the words of a great philosopher who said, ‘life is like a party, and parties weren’t meant to last.’ Perhaps our extinction is the end of the party."

Last Masquerade is an adaptation of a 24-channel installed work called And In Conclusion whose premiere showing is from January 27 to May 28, 2021 at 836M Gallery in San Francisco. The installed work is a collision of two cycles existing on two scales – human and humanity. "I wanted to create a complimentary remixed work where the echoes of disaster sounded like a haunted lullaby. At my request, supremely talented composer and performer Amanda Moody wrote the words and music, and I there found the inspiration to pay tribute to our demise. We are out of time." - John Sanborn.

Last Masquerade is a video artwork released as part of the ALWAYS | LAST | FOREVER collection by John Sanborn. Music composed and performed by Amanda Moody. 6:54 | 2020