On 1130 W 17th Street, in the converted attic of apartment 3, is the chapel of Saint Joan the Coyote. The Chapel contains the vision of artist Eliot Kerwyn Daughtry, a vision that pays homage to his transition. "Transition is a spiritual experience that requires acknowledgement of the self. Creation of a sanctified space is a physical manifestation of the energy of the body, a body and spirit connection," says Eliot.

Using materials such as black pipe, tobacco, drawn metal parts, sage, cloth, rope & found objects, Eliot's Chapel suspends our linear capacity for judgment (What do drawn metal parts have to do with tobacco? Or Saint Joan of Arc with Coyote the Trickster?) and reconstructs that energy as an intense, known and knowable, yet unspeakable force of silence and spirit.

The centerpiece is a painting of a being suspended (or crucified? ascending? descending?) mid-air, as though we see catch sight of it, briefly, on a journey from somewhere, to somewhere. A passing glance projects a crucifixation, but the hands are open, the feet splayed. This transfiguration, then, is not one of sacrifice, but of revelation. The hands invite us with their expansive triumph and compassion while the feet, utterly relaxed, tell us this journey is both tiring and uplifting, requiring forces other than one's own, or greater than one thought, to reconcile.

Saint Joan and Coyote offer support to this being (perhaps they hold this being in mid-air). Altars to both figures reside on either side of the chapel, yet each is a work of art, a whole reckoning force. Saint Joan chose death rather than remove her male clothing, which her voices bid her to wear. "Joan has been a constant theme in my work since I was 13 years old."

Eliot continues, "Coyote announced his influence in my life about 10 years ago, and has endured to become a powerful symbol for me of the trickster energy involved in the transit between genders."

Eliot's work is filled with tricks just like this one: look once, you see a mannequin head; look again, and the head is filled with one and half years of syringes Eliot has used to inject himself with testosterone. The trickster makes us question the whole notion of self-made man.

Look across from the mannequin head, and you'll see chimney-like steel parts. The metaphor of forging metal (in which the steel is heated to extremely high temperatures so that it can be molded into something new) comes to mind as a useful one for a transition (transsexual or otherwise). Try again, says the trickster. These steel parts are deep drawn, molded through a process where hundreds of tons of pressure is exerted on the metal. The metal bends "through a sheer act of will," states Eliot.

Perhaps genders bend and morph through a sheer act of will. Find out for yourself. Go see Eliot's work. If you're a spiritual seeker, a changeling, or just have a good 'ole sense of curiosity, take time on Friday evening, Saturday or Sunday (September 26-28) to see The Chapel of Saint Joan  the Coyote.