Last Thursday, April 20, performance art students bared it all at their annual spring showcase known as VertigoMini. As with many performance art shows, audience members aren’t always sure of what to expect when they walk in.

The same was true of this show, which was free to the public and took place in the Kamerick Art Building.

“It’s all part of the experience of performance art,” said Noah Doely, an assistant professor in the art department. “It’s encountering the unexpected.”

Whether the performance artists walked around with a trail of plastic bottles following them, or were locked in a glass case undressing and trying on different pieces of clothing, the halls of the Kamerick Art Building were transformed into a canvas onto which the performance artists applied their craft.

One performance piece featured a male student lying on a bed encouraging passersby to come spoon with him — an offer that many students accepted. Elsewhere in the building, another artist was wailing and moaning the word “No,” while another simply screamed “Next!” and welcomed a student into a dark room before slamming the door shut behind them.

A line quickly formed outside the door, as students wondered aloud to each other what exactly lay behind that door.

As it turned out, after the door slammed behind a student, the same woman who had previously screamed asked each student to sign and date a form — a non-disclosure agreement. When the form was signed and dated, she opened a drawer and presented the student with two options: a tampon or a sucker.

Whichever one the student picked, the opposite was inserted in their mouth, after which point they were asked to sit while the next person was yelled at to come in. Doely, who had a tampon inserted in his mouth, described the sensation, saying, “[It] can be a startling experience for some people, but it’s just part of the experience.”

Amber Loeffelholz, a Waterloo teacher who was in attendance, discussed the event’s effect on attendees, saying, “It jerks a lot of emotions.”

Loeffelholz wasn’t the only one to have that sort of experience. There were people stopping to simply shake their heads in astonishment while viewing an exhibit, while others looked as if they were in tears.

Michelle Joyce, a junior studio art major and performance artist, described the reaction of some viewers.

“Some of them felt like they were happy, and then you would get the ones who were probably disappointed,” Joyce said. “I was almost amused inside because I know how it feels.”

To be sure, walking into Vertigo may have felt like walking into an episode from the Twilight Zone — not knowing what to expect and not knowing what everything means. For some, it’s not always about one meaning behind a performance.

Benji Davis, a freshman philosophy major, expressed this sentiment, citing the ambiguous nature of many of the performances.

“That’s also why I liked it because everything is so open to any kind of interpretation,” Davis said.