“Am I supposed to run after them?” I asked as I watched artists Anh Vo and Erinn Buhyoff ride away together on a gold flake-encrusted Phoenix-brand bike. A fur coat-clad Vo was at the helm, veering left onto West 10th Street while Buhyoff sat directly behind them, a DIY woodwind instrument fashioned out of a bilge pump hose draped over his neck.

This was the start of Vo’s guerrilla performance “Phoenix Forever,” a newly commissioned piece for the third edition of The Immigrant Artist Biennial. The event was cloaked in secrecy—the audience knew very little about it, and had to email or DM the biennial organizers in order to be told the exact time and location of the performance. No further description was given other than the enigmatic phrase: “Something happens at the river.”