Hoopers.(The Talk of the Town)(Christian Jankowski's Rooftop Routine)

Two months ago, the German artist Christian Jankowski was making coffee in his eighth-floor apartment, on Division Street, when something out the window caught his eye: a woman, dressed in a tank top and shorts, hula-hooping on a rooftop. "There was something very peaceful in this movement, something hypnotic almost," he said later. "Within the boxes of the city, you had this circular hula hoop." Jankowski had been contemplating a commission for Performa 07, a festival of performance-based visual art. He recalled, "I thought, This is a great inspiration, thank you."

Jankowski set out to find his muse, whom he referred to as Mystery Woman. He drew up a sign, which he posted on the front door of her building, on Ludlow Street, announcing an open call for hula hoopers. (He didn't mention anything about the rooftop, worrying that it might get her in trouble with her landlord.) No response. Later, he caught a young man on his way out of the building and asked him if he knew anyone inside who hula-hooped. "Yes, my aunt," the boy said. The boy's aunt attested that she did indeed hula-hoop, but not on the roof. However, she had an idea who did--the woman in Apartment 12. With the help of a bilingual assistant, Beatrice Glow, Jankowski returned with a letter, written in both English and Chinese, which he fastened to Mystery Woman's door. ("Dear neighbor! I am an artist producing a hula-hoop performance for New York City. Your routine was an inspiration for me and I would like to meet you.") Hours later, she was on the phone.

Mystery Woman turned out to be Suat Ling Chua, an immigrant from Malaysia who works as a manicurist at a spa on Grand Street. Her rainbow-colored hula hoop had been a gift, and in the course of a year of rooftop gyrating she had lost more than thirty pounds. Jankowski described to Chua what he had in mind: he would invite an audience to the roof of his building, where they would watch her perform her usual workout across the street. Gradually, other hula hoopers would appear on surrounding rooftops, creating a convergence of surreal imagery, choreography, and calisthenics. The piece ...