Everyone's Articles - conectom2024-03-19T14:05:47Zhttp://conectom.leimay.org/profiles/blog/feed?xn_auth=noEconomics, Mental Health, and “The Industry”tag:conectom.leimay.org,2019-07-22:5831649:BlogPost:960742019-07-22T17:42:45.000ZDrew Weinsteinhttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/DrewWeinstein
<p>Economics, Mental Health, and “The Industry”</p>
<p>A Reflection of Sorts by Drew Weinstein</p>
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<p>About a year after I graduated from Ithaca College with a Bachelors of Arts in Drama and a Music Minor, I experienced my first of what was to become many panic attacks. Half a year or so after graduating, I moved to New York City to pursue my dream of creating and directing what I perceived to be “experimental” and “immersive” works of theatre and performance (I know those are kind of…</p>
<p>Economics, Mental Health, and “The Industry”</p>
<p>A Reflection of Sorts by Drew Weinstein</p>
<p> </p>
<p>About a year after I graduated from Ithaca College with a Bachelors of Arts in Drama and a Music Minor, I experienced my first of what was to become many panic attacks. Half a year or so after graduating, I moved to New York City to pursue my dream of creating and directing what I perceived to be “experimental” and “immersive” works of theatre and performance (I know those are kind of useless buzz words to describe works of art, but I was 22 and didn’t know better). I spent a few months working fairly grueling hours at a Dos Toros before ending up with two equally as exhausting production assistant gigs. Both jobs ended within days of each other at the beginning of March and I found myself suddenly without any work or any prospects of finding work. What I perceived as a sudden collapse of opportunity brought me to the steps of the Jefferson Market branch of the New York Public Library in a bout of full on panic.</p>
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<p>These attacks were and remain a painfully clear marker that something was going wrong in my life. However, this is not an isolated incident, nor is it unique to me. Though at best frustrating and at times fully debilitating, these kinds of episodes are far from uncommon. According to the National Institute of Mental Health, one in five U.S. adults live with mental illness,<a href="#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1"><span>[1]</span></a> with young adults ages 18-25 experiencing mental illness at higher rates than any other demographic.<a href="#_ftn2" name="_ftnref2"><span>[2]</span></a> There are a myriad of possible reasons why these statistics are so staggering. However, there is a connection between this increased mental pressure on younger generations, key economic shifts in most Western democratic countries beginning in the late 1970s and early 1980s, and the current arts and freelance economy that I believe is important to highlight.</p>
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<p>The remaining essay is a continual jump between a few somewhat scattered thoughts and ideas that hopefully come together in the end (but might not), beginning with a series of inquiries I began making after stumbling upon Ruth Whippman’s NY Times opinion piece on the nature of the modern gig economy. Ms. Whippman, author of <em>America the Anxious</em> and <em>The Pursuit of Happiness</em>, is a British journalist who has done a significant amount of research on the relationship between the concept of happiness and anxiety. In her recent opinion piece, Whippman describes the increased pressures of the modern freelance world as a “special hellspring of anxiety.” When browsing through a few months ago, this certainly caught my eye and I began digging further. On one hand, many articles and press releases of late (such as <a href="https://www.upwork.com/press/2017/10/17/freelancing-in-america-2017/">this</a> gem released by the online freelance platform Upwork) seem to equate the rise of the freelance workforce<a href="#_ftn3" name="_ftnref3"><span>[3]</span></a> as akin to the coming of the next Messiah, Ms. Whippman remains skeptical. She describes a mass selling frenzy where, as a freelancer, she spends only a minor amount of time actually doing her job while the majority goes to a variety of “unpaid micro-labor” that includes “Ambivalently ‘maintaining a presence on social media,’ attempting to sell a semi-fictional, much more appealing version of myself in the vain hope that this might somehow help me sell some actual stuff at some unspecific future time.”</p>
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<p>This insatiable need to promote and self-curate is driven by our current market, which features a collapse of the middle class, a general lack of resources for younger artists in an increasingly expensive world, and a more peculiar psychological drive. “…the sad truth is that many of us would probably make more money stacking shelves or working at the drive-through than selling our ‘thing.’ The real prize is deeper, more existential. What this is really about, for many of us, is a roaring black hole of psychological need.” Though perhaps over-dramatic, I find Whippman’s thoughts very relatable. I have placed the “thing” I am selling (i.e. my artistic output or work) at the bedrock of my identity as a human being. “Theatre and sound artist” isn’t just a fancy title for myself that I put on my website, it’s a method for defining who I am as a person and my own self-worth.</p>
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<p>I want to take a step back for a second and say that I understand that in many ways I “chose” to pursue the life of an artist which for centuries has been a financially difficult proposition. I am not trying to complain about the financial difficulties of the arts and of individual artists because those are already very well documented. What I am more interested in is the tether between artistic output and self-worth. There’s an old joke about friends in the theatre industry in New York running into each other. The first question they’ll ask each other is always “what are you working on?” rather than “How are you?” What generally isn’t discussed is that whenever I get asked this question, I feel an insatiable urge to sound as impressive as humanly possible “…well, I’m gearing up for a festival that I’m the associate producer on … I’m creating my solo show, it’s slow going but I have some irons in the fire for future productions … my friend wrote a fantastic play that I’m directing and we’re going to be premiering it in the Spring…” I understand that this impulse is not entirely malicious. Many of my friends work in the industry, we all want to know about one another’s work, and it’s nice to exchange information about projects and creative pursuits. Yet, the desire to seem impressive or busy is concerning and takes a discernable psychological toll. Just the other day I had a friend tell me that they thought of me as “one of those people who is always working on something,” and it was probably the best I’ve felt about myself in weeks. Acclaimed theatre director, Anne Bogart, comments on this rather eloquently in her short essay <em>The Business of Busyness</em>, “The danger with busyness is that it can become the baseline of one’s experience. We can live in thrall to it and then forget that we have the agency to make our own choices… does busyness make us feel important?” My answer in a heartbeat is – “YES! Good God does it make me feel important!” And when I have a lot going on and I don’t have the time to sit with myself and consider where my life is actually headed, everything seems fine. The sense of self-importance created by a constant stream of activity and pursuits acts like a drug that sedates me when I’m under its influence.</p>
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<p>But what happens when I’m not? Where does this leave someone when the work dries up for a period of time? I am always talking about wanting and needing more time for the real passion projects, the work I dream of making, but when I find or make time for these projects, I end up feeling like shit about myself as a person. Why does having spare time continually thrust me into a bout of existential depression which ends up depleting the time that I so desperately wanted for myself in the first place? And how do you fight against the feelings of depression and lack of motivation when everything around you seems to remind you of all the work, opportunities, and experiences that you’re missing out on (looking at you Facebook…)?</p>
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<p>I would strongly suggest that, while we may have a degree of control over our own personal perceptions and attitude, these depressive experiences are also products of our current economic system and cultural values. I know I’m making quite a jump here, but we have to consider that the United States currently operates under a neoliberal economic model designed to elevate the market and minimize government intervention in an attempt to foster “unconstrained competition between self-interested individuals.” Neoliberal economic theory was initially developed after WWII as partially an economic means of preventing further rise of communist or fascist governments and partially as a way for a handful of people to get very rich. By re-distributing wealth to certain individuals (and remember that corporations are legally considered people with rights…) rather than the state, it was designed to keep people in competition with one another for lucrative financial opportunities. One intended effect of this was that individuals would be less likely to band together under the kind of cultural or state nationalisms which led key European countries to fascism. However, it was not significantly taken up in policy until the 1970s when many North American and European countries began embracing “…laissez-faire governance committed to the advancement of market-based competition and reward.”</p>
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<p>As the theorists behind neoliberal economics knew, any shift in economic policy would have a ripple effect on our cultural value system. According to a recent study by Thomas Curran and Andrew P. Hill, “Dominant cultural values of society at any one point in time are reflected in the norms of its social and civic institutions and these institutions shape individual attitudes, values, beliefs, and personalities.” Simply put, the cultural values of the United States of America (and many other countries) shifted towards competition and away from interpersonal collaboration in response to this change in economic policy. This, in turn placed a “…heavier burden on recent generations of young people to strive against one another under the auspices of meritocracy…” Meritocracy is the belief that economic wealth and social status should be based solely on the merit of the individual. The United States projects this cultural value despite a truly horrific history of institutional inequality based on race, ethnicity, gender, religion and sexual orientation which continues today. It falsely claims that no matter who you are, hard work and self-perseverance alone are enough for you to achieve your dreams. What it actually creates is a doctrine that “falsely and insidiously connects the principles of educational and professional achievement, status, and wealth with innate personal value.” </p>
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<p>When you consider this cultural ideology in relation to our general well-being, the current mental health crises is perhaps less shocking. Curran and Hill focus their investigation specifically on the concept of perfectionism. According to their research, three key types of perfectionism have increased dramatically over the last 27 years<a href="#_ftn4" name="_ftnref4"><span>[4]</span></a>. The most significant increase has been in socially prescribed perfectionism. This kind of perfectionism revolves around the perceived demands of others in a social context. Not surprisingly, “…rising socially prescribed perfectionism dovetails with observations of rising externality of control, anxiety, and neurosis among young people…” This is perhaps even more compounded by the unrestrained rise of social media and the increasing pressure to present an online version of yourself which is both self-realizing and effortless.</p>
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<p>What is also worth noting is the rise in self-oriented perfectionism in which “individuals attach irrational importance to being perfect, hold unrealistic expectations of themselves, and are punitive in their self-evaluations.” Though this form of perfectionism contains a useful and motivational component, when left unchecked it can make it impossible to derive lasting satisfaction from one’s own accomplishments and creates a feedback loop of needing to constantly achieve beyond one’s previous potential. So, while some might look at my artistic and career trajectory in a positive light, I am unable to see it as anything other than not enough, a thought which feeds back on itself and contributes to regular waves of depression, anxiety, and panic. This is magnified by the constant rampage of social media posts which feed us stories of everyone else’s successes. Successes that are out there waiting for you if only you are capable, smart, creative, disciplined, or just plain good enough to achieve it.</p>
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<p>Sadly, there are thousands of other people endlessly battling for those same few opportunities. I, like many people my age, have been sold fantastic ideas of what our lives can be (if we just work hard enough…), which are highly unrealistic given our current socioeconomic climate. Somewhere along the line I bought in and shackled my self-worth to these ideas and dreams of myself. I told myself that if I worked hard and struggled against the odds, I could live a life of excitement, creativity, and self-realization. It wasn’t until this ideology had already become a core part of my belief system that I thought to question its intentions as anything other than supportive. After all, this is what many people in my generation were told. I didn’t expect it to be easy (to be fair, no one said that it would be), but I held onto an expectation that it could happen nonetheless. But this magical “it” is highly, and I’d argue intentionally, illusive. Our lives are tossed about in an economic and cultural model that must grow in order to survive. In order to get the most out of us and propel growth, this model needs to keep us wanting more and competing with each other for “it” rather than settling into our lives or roles in the workforce in a healthy or community-driven capacity. I have personally internalized this by developing perfectionist tendencies which in turn leave me unsatisfied with any achievements because I will still be comparing myself to my peers. This social comparison fuels the need to compete instead of collaborate, in hopes that my own personal career will grow and flourish to newer and newer heights so that I can someday “make it.” All the while, the “it” keeps moving further and further away. There is no limit to how far “it” can move because someone else will always have more than me. No achievement will ever make me feel the fulfillment or actualization I’ve been sold because it’s not supposed to.</p>
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<p>So, it’s no wonder I began having panic attacks when I first moved to the city. And it should come as no surprise that they have continued. These attacks are at best explainable and at worst part of the plan. And unfortunately, I the artistic industry in New York City is complicit in this plan. To caveat, in no way am I claiming that this is a specific problem to the arts (this issue spans all industry under our current socioeconomic model). But how do we, as artists, hope to connect with others or create positive change through our work if we aren’t willing to change our own behavior? How can we show people that there is a life outside of a soul-crushing economic and cultural model if we take part in it and hurt ourselves and each other in the process? This isn’t to say that the individuals who make up the collective theatre and performance industry don’t care for each other’s well-being. On the contrary, some of the kindest, most generous, and wonderful individuals make up the New York City arts community. But are we not to some degree trapped within a larger system that is meant to keep us competing? Afterall, we’re expected to constantly schmooze to get ahead and spend our time and energy presenting an often-unrealistic image of ourselves to attract followers and appeal to producers and presenters. Further, when we continue to communicate even at a social level on the basis of our work or output are we not allowing this system to churn on (even if said work aims at taking down the system itself)?</p>
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<p>I don’t profess to know the answer to these questions – and there is a world of nuance and research that would be required to properly understand how our institutional and interpersonal models in the arts world contribute to the larger economic and cultural ideology. However, I do think these are worth asking. Even if the system is stacked against our mental well-being, becoming aware of the cards we’ve been dealt can perhaps allow us to take steps in addressing our own psychology, our industry, and our interpersonal relationships. How do we define our self-worth, and how do we perceive the worth of others? How can we shift our individual ideologies away from this need to keep busy, keep relevant, and grow our careers without becoming “irrelevant” and out of work? How can I personally shift my internal perceptions of my-self and others? I know I can’t speak for anyone else, but this mental ideology is wrecking me from the inside out. I have the privilege to be able to live in this city and pursue my artistic dreams. Further, I have the privilege of being a straight white man in a world hellbent on giving straight white men a massive social, economic, and cultural advantage. And somehow, I’ve still found a way to be miserable. That’s seriously insane. Writing out these thoughts in what appears to be a fairly haphazard manner is a first step in beginning to examining the reasons behind my mental frustration. My hope is that through this examination, I can work towards shedding the individualistic mindset that brought me here in the first place. And perhaps, breaking my internal cycle of competition, individualism, and anxiety can make a small crack in the larger cultural and economic systems themselves.</p>
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<p>End Notes</p>
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<p><a href="#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1"><span>[1]</span></a> Approximately 44.7 million in 2016. Additionally, 31.1% of all U.S. adults will experience any anxiety disorder at some point in their lives.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref2" name="_ftn2"><span>[2]</span></a> 22.1% of the young adult population have experienced any mental illness (AMI).</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref3" name="_ftn3"><span>[3]</span></a> For the purposes here, I am defining the rise of the the freelance workforce as a statistically proven increase In workers making a living through jobs that are contract-based.</p>
<p><a href="#_ftnref4" name="_ftn4"><span>[4]</span></a> The time frame is significant as it relates to the rise of neoliberal economic policy in Europe and North America.</p>
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<p>Works Cited</p>
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<p>Bogart, Anne. <em>The Business of Busyness</em>. SITI Company, 18 Dec. 2014, siti.org/content/business-busyness.</p>
<p>Deutschkron, Shoshana. <em>Freelancers Predicted to Become the U.S. Workforce Majority within a Decade, with Nearly 50% of Millennial Workers Already Freelancing, Annual "Freelancing in America" Study Finds</em>. Upwork, 28 Oct. 2017, <a href="http://www.upwork.com/press/2017/10/17/freelancing-in-america-2017/">www.upwork.com/press/2017/10/17/freelancing-in-america-2017/</a>.</p>
<p>Hellebuyck, Michele, et al. “The State of Mental Health in America, 2019.” <em>Mental Health in America</em>, <a href="http://www.mentalhealthamerica.net/issues/mental-health-america-printed-reports">www.mentalhealthamerica.net/issues/mental-health-america-printed-reports</a>.</p>
<p>Whippman, Ruth. <em>Everything Is for Sale Now. Even Us.</em> The New York Times, 24 Nov. 2018, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/24/opinion/sunday/gig-economy-self-promotion-anxiety.html">www.nytimes.com/2018/11/24/opinion/sunday/gig-economy-self-promotion-anxiety.html</a>.</p>
<p>Curran, T., & Hill, A. P. (2017, December 28). “Perfectionism Is Increasing Over Time: A Meta- Analysis of Birth Cohort Differences From 1989 to 2016.” <em>Psychological Bulletin</em>. Advance online publication. <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/bul0000138">http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/bul0000138</a> </p>
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<p> </p>ESSAY // Movement as Language, Healing, and Liberationtag:conectom.leimay.org,2019-07-13:5831649:BlogPost:963082019-07-13T11:59:22.000ZNana Chinarahttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/NanaChinara
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I have been dancing since I first felt the flesh surrounding me in my mother’s womb. Dance for me, like many and most I know, is my purest form of expression. It opens light inside of me, and has been a language between my brain, my body, and my spirit that only I can fully understand. </span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">When I think of dance, I think of movement, performing, being in motion. This dance, this movement…</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I have been dancing since I first felt the flesh surrounding me in my mother’s womb. Dance for me, like many and most I know, is my purest form of expression. It opens light inside of me, and has been a language between my brain, my body, and my spirit that only I can fully understand. </span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">When I think of dance, I think of movement, performing, being in motion. This dance, this movement</span> <i><span style="font-weight: 400;">really</span></i><span style="font-weight: 400;">, is the way that I heal. I use movement to not only exist and navigate through the world, I also use it to survive and thrive. I communicate with my ancestors in movement, I sanctify my body in movement, I question, I reflect, I research in movement.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I am not a formally trained dancer, and this has surfaced as more than a challenge in New York City dance spaces. I often become my own worst enemy, allowing self doubt and insecurities to interrupt opportunities that arise for me. Through my experience without professional or pre-professional training, I have dived into self-research as the basis for creating work, and developing technique. </span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Technique - ballet, jazz, hip-hop, etc - was developed by people. As a person, I realize I too, have the power to create a technique on my body, balanced with training and rigor. Self research in the forms of writing, film making, moving, questioning, reading, interviewing, and meditating, is the way that I find and get lost in technique. I find my natural movement, distill it, expand it, morph it, root it, and allow it to inform me. My body is a moving source of information - information that is trustworthy, honest, and true; information that is rooted in Black Queer Femmehood. This information that flows from my body is the way in which my body has learned to survive, to thrive, to carry sadness and expand in joy, this information is experiential and experience based. My source of movement is informed by my lifelong journey of healing and liberating as omu singular body, and in the bodies of my communities.Thus, my technique comes from my body's natural choreography and embodied way of being on this earth!</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I teach “Healing the Black Body” a program, fellowship, collective, and workshop offering to use performance as a tool for healing and liberation in Black Queer communities. In my pedagogy I ask participants to find their stories that their body is holding and tease them out. My own process as a mover deeply informs my facilitation as I lead participants to find strength and technique from one's own movement and embodied language of survival, thriving, existing and experience in this world. We have always been multilingual beings, and when we decolonize the ways in which we identify language, we can see that within one person contains at least three languages: the language in which they communicate with themselves, the language in which they communicate with their community, and the language in which they communicate with others. </span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">For me, I speak in Black vernacular, in English, in Code-Switch. I also speak in movement, in embodiment, in stillness. Technique, to me, is a language. Movement informed by my experiences, is my healing and liberating language. The ways in which I move and build technique are the ways I place power to my knowing, my being, my self as</span> <i><span style="font-weight: 400;">enough</span></i><span style="font-weight: 400;">. </span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Movement, dance, performance are more than just a mode of expression; they are intricate languages that are not 100% trainable in the form of someone else's technique. For me, they are a language of healing and liberation deeply informed by my self experience. As I move forward in my lifelong journey, I continue to use myself as a training source, and place deeper value in intricate, decolonized languages that need not be interpreted. </span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I continue to use movement to heal my Black body. </span></p>
<p><br/><br/></p>Working with the Environment through Dance and Filmtag:conectom.leimay.org,2019-07-12:5831649:BlogPost:962092019-07-12T20:49:08.000ZKelly Toddhttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/KellyTodd
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/3278154280?profile=original" rel="noopener" target="_blank"><img class="align-full" src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/3278154280?profile=RESIZE_710x"></img></a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">*Photo by Natalie Deryn Johnson*</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">The LEIMAY Fellowship is supplying me with the space and resources to create the second film in the environmental dance film series,…</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/3278154280?profile=original" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/3278154280?profile=RESIZE_710x" class="align-full"/></a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">*Photo by Natalie Deryn Johnson*</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">The LEIMAY Fellowship is supplying me with the space and resources to create the second film in the environmental dance film series,</span> <i><span style="font-weight: 400;">Under Review</span></i><span style="font-weight: 400;">. On December 4, 2017, the President drastically reduced the size of two national monuments in Utah to allow for oil and gas development: Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante. This reduction put 25 other national monuments at risk for industrial development; coal mining, logging, oil and gas extraction, and commercial development, destroying the already limited untouched wildlife and nature in this country. </span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">As we continue to remove ourselves further from nature, and our political house advocates against making environmental changes, we have become ignorant to our role and relationship with our planet. Our species is the only species that has the cognitive ability to measure influence and the capacity for larger change, yet we ignore scientific data and the Earth’s reaction to our presence. We have the understanding to know we are harming the environment and we have the ability to do something about it. Therefore, we should inspire one another to make change where change is necessary. Preservation of our public lands is a necessary battle in the overall Climate Change war. </span></p>
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<p><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/3278143807?profile=original" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/3278143807?profile=RESIZE_710x" class="align-center"/></a></p>
<p><em>*Behind the scenes for Under Review: Gold Butte,</em> Gold Butte National Monument June <em>2018*</em></p>
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<p><i><span style="font-weight: 400;">Under Review: Katahdin</span></i> <span style="font-weight: 400;">retells the story of “The Giving Tree” through dance to showcase our modern day relationship with trees and their paper products. I am using this story for our society to become more mindful about how we manipulate the landscape and for us to recognize the consequences for ourselves and our kin. </span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">As a lifelong outdoor enthusiast, a world traveler, and an artist with supporting degrees in Biology and Environmental Science, I’ve always looked towards the natural world for inspiration. Whether capturing it on film, or creating live site-specific performance, nature is the place I go to jumpstart an idea or when I’m stuck in a process. I find myself searching for idiosyncratic relationships between nature and human beings. For example, I’m drawn to how vines and roots take over architecture, cracking the paint off the exterior and softening the floor with soil. Or I’ll look back at scientific research and how it can be translated into movement by showing how canyons are created through natural weathering of wind, water, and snow and how trees communicate through their underground root system to share nutrients and send messages of danger or pollination. I am interested in how dance can enhance the environment rather than distract from it. This means becoming more intentional with movement phrases and intensifying textures through the lens of a camera. </span></p>
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<p><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/3278146135?profile=original" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/3278146135?profile=RESIZE_710x" class="align-full"/></a></p>
<p>*Scouting for <em>Under Review: Katahdin</em>, Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument September 2018*</p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I have found myself becoming frustrated with how our culture is attempting to combat climate change by instilling fear through showing forest fires, rising sea levels, destructive hurricanes. These all are important facts to share with our public, but I’m interested in what if we showed the beauty our land already holds? What if we made these sweeping landscapes that cover 15% of American land widely available for viewing for free? And what if we used emotional storytelling and the exquisiteness of movement through dance to trigger a reaction and a call to action from our public? Maybe then we can come together on a local to global level to create solutions for climate change. I am seeking ways to inspire through beauty rather than motivating through fear. Through my years of artistic creation, living in NYC and traveling around the world, it has become clear to me that not all people have access to distant travels and taking time to be surrounded by nature. Capturing the landscape footage of Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument allows the monument to be available to all. We are bringing this film onto the screen and into the laps of people that may be too old to experience hiking, may be financially restricted, or may be living on the other side of the world. This film brings together cultures and communities around the world through a shared admiration of our earth. </span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Though my team and I are working with Monuments and Parks across the nation, it is important for me to become involved on a local level. Climate Change is an opportunity for our cities to become involved in creative ways regarding how we get our public to experience nature on a day to day level. It is my belief that we as a society wont fight for what we don’t see. What attracted me to the LEIMAY Fellowship is the work and involvement they have with the New York Restoration Project. Merging the arts with these gardens will assist in drawing a wider audience to cultivate different experiences in nature. Being surrounded in a concrete jungle has made my appreciation for nature that more prominent, which also has created a strong fire in me to fight for everyone to have opportunities outdoors. How you can help is if there is a community space in your neighborhood you would like to see transformed into a garden, you may contact New York Restoration Project and they will assist you in the steps to transforming this space. </span></p>
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<p><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/3278152079?profile=original" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/3278152079?profile=RESIZE_710x" class="align-full"/></a></p>
<p>*Still from <em>Under Review: Gold Butte</em>, the first film in the <em>Under Review</em> series*</p>
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<p>Watch the full first film</p>
<p><a href="https://vimeo.com/331623376" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Under Review: Gold Butte</a> </p>Re-Performing Asian-nesstag:conectom.leimay.org,2019-07-12:5831649:BlogPost:959962019-07-12T20:47:09.000ZRebecca Fittonhttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/RebeccaFitton
<p><em>What are the words you use to identify yourself?</em></p>
<p><em>Where do you call home?</em></p>
<p><em>What is your relationship with “your countries?”</em></p>
<p><em>Where do you go to be Asian?</em></p>
<p><em>How do you stay Asian?</em></p>
<p><em>Do you ever feel like you need to present your Asian-ness?</em></p>
<p><em>What’s your relationship to the broader POC community?</em></p>
<p><em>When did you learn about the history of Asian discrimination in the United…</em></p>
<p><em>What are the words you use to identify yourself?</em></p>
<p><em>Where do you call home?</em></p>
<p><em>What is your relationship with “your countries?”</em></p>
<p><em>Where do you go to be Asian?</em></p>
<p><em>How do you stay Asian?</em></p>
<p><em>Do you ever feel like you need to present your Asian-ness?</em></p>
<p><em>What’s your relationship to the broader POC community?</em></p>
<p><em>When did you learn about the history of Asian discrimination in the United States?</em></p>
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<p>These are some of the questions I have been asking over the past few months to friends, colleagues, and family who broadly identify as Asian.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The conversations have been fruitful, surprising, similar, scary and affirming, very often all at once and over and over again.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>I’m digging into the –NESS of Asian-ness.</p>
<p>I’m questioning my relationship with “Asian American.”</p>
<p>And I’m asking – where are you in this journey? And ultimately, what is your responsibility towards diversifying the voices and people we see as Asian American?</p>
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<p>Let me back up.</p>
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<p>I’m not American.</p>
<p>Really, I’m about as far away from Asian American as you can get. So, I wanted to answer a few of my own questions here to reveal a little bit of the WHY behind these questions. This is important to me as I’m not sharing the other conversations verbatim, they are not my stories to tell. But they will surface indirectly in my work one day and continue to inform how I move through space and time as me, a performer, educator, and activist.</p>
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<p>--</p>
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<p>Bi-racial, Eurasian, English, English-Malaysian, Chinese. I grew up mostly in Wisconsin.</p>
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<p>These are the phrases I currently use to identify myself. The Wisconsin response is my “I’m not going to answer the question you are actually asking me” line.</p>
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<p>Home is so many places. It is Wisconsin where I lived, in the same house, from 6 months to 18 years old. Its bratwurst splitting on a hot grill, bubblers instead of drinking fountains and whitetail deer jumping through the backyard.</p>
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<p>Home is Yorkshire, though technically I was born in Lincolnshire, in a town called Scunthorpe.</p>
<p>Home is the Lake District, it's cream tea, it's fish and chips.</p>
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<p>Home is mosquito-net-covered beds in Malaysia with gung gung opening a durian outside the bedroom, swinging a machete to open the sticky, stinky, spiky rind.</p>
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<p>Home is the hawker stalls in Singapore, the abundance of moist towelettes and ais kacang.</p>
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<p>Home is complicated geographically but beautiful. It’s when I’m with my mum, dad, and sister who were, for a long time, the only family members in the States.</p>
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<p>Home is firing up Skype to talk weekly, monthly, annually to family in all those different places, waiting for the signal to be strong enough so that we can all lip read across oceans.</p>
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<p>I grew up visiting Malaysia/Singapore, England, Malaysia/Singapore, England, Malaysia/Singapore, England. I didn’t go to any other country except those three until I was 21.</p>
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<p>I like each country, I love certain aspects and I could do without some of it.</p>
<p>I could do without the guilt of knowing that I used to say water with an English accent.</p>
<p>I would like to have easy access to Yorkshire pudding and a Sunday roast year-round.</p>
<p>I could do without the capitalism of Singapore.</p>
<p>I would love to have chicken satay every day for the rest of my life.</p>
<p>I could leave behind the jetlag.</p>
<p>I would have liked to have longer relationships with all of my grandparents.</p>
<p>I wish I hadn’t assimilated my language to erase por por and gung gung from my tongue when trying to explain them as my grandparents during my time in Florida.</p>
<p>I wish I could hold onto the settees, bins, washing ups, and soya sauces of my life, but they slip away as I move further from my parents and establish new systems of family and language.</p>
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<p><em>Where you go to be Asian? And - how do you stay Asian? And – do you feel the need to present your Asian-ness?</em> These three questions all come from a place of personal insecurity, disbelief, half-ness and the perpetual “not-quite-enough.”</p>
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<p>I am English. I am white. I am so VERY English. Fitton is a common surname in England, go look up Gawsworth Old Hall. English is my native language. I can easily navigate England when I’m there. I understand the politics and history of England partially in thanks to the western education I received.</p>
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<p>I am also Chinese. I am yellow. I am from Malaysia. I am a Tan from Southern China. I can’t speak Cantonese, Malay or Teochew. I can’t confidently navigate Malaysia’s geography and I've never been to China. I vaguely understand the history and politics of Malaysia though much of that is centered around a colonial narrative.</p>
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<p>--</p>
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<p>I didn’t know I could use “people of color” language until I was in university. I was using Asian identifiers before then and understood some of the oppression towards Asians in America and abroad, but not in the way I thought second, third, fourth or fifth generation Asian Americans do. As I work through these questions and dive into the history of Asian America, I am working to reclaim, restate and re-perform my own Asian-ness. I am reading the language of the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act and comparing it to Executive Order 13769, otherwise known as the 2017 Travel Ban. I’m always performing my Asian-ness just as I am performing my white-ness in overt and covert ways that feel authentic to me. And it is all ongoing. I've cherished the conversations I've had thus far, to hear others' stories and experiences but, the most valuable aspect has been having a platform to say, "I hear you" and "me too." Let's do more of that. </p>
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<p> </p>Creating performance through the lens of a photographertag:conectom.leimay.org,2019-07-12:5831649:BlogPost:960662019-07-12T02:57:27.000ZEffy Greyhttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/EffyGrey
<p style="text-align: center;"><b>Creating performance through the lens of a photographer:</b></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><span style="font-weight: 400;"> Preface: The intended reader is all sides of the article: choreographer, photographer, and audience. </span></i></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><span style="font-weight: 400;"> The </span></i></span><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><span style="font-weight: 400;">following is a compilation of…</span></i></span></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><b>Creating performance through the lens of a photographer:</b></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><span style="font-weight: 400;"> Preface: The intended reader is all sides of the article: choreographer, photographer, and audience. </span></i></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><span style="font-weight: 400;"> The </span></i></span><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><span style="font-weight: 400;">following is a compilation of ideas and struggles I have found participating in each role. Generally,</span></i></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><span style="font-weight: 400;"> performance photography principles apply across studio, promotional, rehearsal, and live performance</span></i></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><span style="font-weight: 400;"> documentation circumstances as choreographers may apply to similar scenarios in different settings. </span></i></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><span style="font-weight: 400;"> It is by no means suggesting a best or absolute way of creating work</span></i><b>. </b> <i><span style="font-weight: 400;">I do suggest that due to the</span></i></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><span style="font-weight: 400;"> availability of photography, all individuals have a pre-programed understanding of it even if they cannot</span></i></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><span style="font-weight: 400;"> directly articulate it (I recommend looking up advertisement, branding, and image association research</span></i></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><span style="font-weight: 400;"> for further information.)</span></i></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><span style="font-weight: 400;"> </span></i></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><span style="font-weight: 400;"> A special thank you for Isabel Umali and Rachel Switlick for editing </span></i></span></p>
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<p style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-weight: 400;">“[...] it is not recommended to lighten up a dark space.”</span></i></p>
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<p><b> </b> <span style="font-weight: 400;">Because of the strong focus on the ideas of community and the sense of self for this fellowship, I’m realizing the overlap between my community, my choreography, and my photography. When I came to NYC, I was more of a dancer and less of a photographer. Then an injury inhibited me from participating as a performer, so I maintained access to the performance community through photography: I met people photographing them, I saw their work through my camera and photos, and I even helped them create their own work through experimental shoots. Through experiencing dance from the photographer's perspective, I gained a lot of information. I have found mechanisms/principles of performance photography, and I apply them as a lens and choreographic tools to create performance work, beyond thinking of creating picturesque moments. Photography is more widely accessible to potential audiences due to its ability to be packaged and sold, its availability, and its simplicity. Picture frames line homes: wedding shots, newborn sessions, school portraits, snaps of one time friends from summer camp, band posters, cityscapes, landscapes, and space fillers. Now that digital and social media has come to the forefront of our daily lives, the general population has access to multitudes of photographs daily. They exist as documentation, craft, and fine art. The form of photography is easily accessible, even if the theme is esoteric because individuals have had to interpret it throughout their lives. When I have inquired about how someone likes/appreciates a photograph, I’ve never experienced the answer, “Well, I’m not a photographer.” However, I’ve been met with that response — and a hesitation or complete refusal — when posing the same question about a performance. Asking them to think about one moment as a picture gets a very thorough response. There is merit to addressing potential crossovers or view points from photographic to choreographic approaches. Along with utilizing the mechanics of photography as a method of making choreographic choices, it harnesses the audiences comprehension of photography and applies it to a less approachable form. Also, an understanding of photography principles could help the choreographer present their work in ways that assist in the production of their desired promotional and documentary material.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"> All photographs begin with light, and it is the guiding factor for the settings on the camera. Contrary to popular belief, “This bathroom light was too good; selfie!” is false.</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">I realize that without a photographer's knowledge, one wouldn't know that the light they like will not translate well to the photo</span><span style="font-weight: 400;">. I tell everyone the best light is the sun and adjust from there. Natural lighting is not always available or reliable, but the sun provides the greatest amount of light to tell the truth in: it allows for clear shots regardless of movement speed. If there is going to be bright, revealing light, all aspects should be treated as visible; therefore, the choreographer should not assume the audience is not going to see something or that it won’t exist in a photograph. A directional light can add clarity to the movement, but allow for obscuring other aspects. It can provide shadows and contrast, but a variation can include a bright directional light with the. For the production process, it is always easier to make shadows darker, but it is not recommended to lighten up a dark space. </span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"> When adjusting for lower intensity light, the photographer can increase the sensitivity of the sensor. Increasing the ISO means increasing the sensitivity, which also increases the grain or noise (term for visual distortion in digital photography). The human eye makes a comparable adjustment with pupil dilation and a process known as dark adaptation. After sitting in dim lighting, people have an increased sensitivity to light. The details eyes receive when adjusting to dimmer light, however, is reduced and they have a similar grain/noise. Also, due to differences in visual acuity, not everyone has the same ability to adjust, and a camera will never have the same acuity as a human eye. I think this may be an important aspect to consider: not everyone has the same capacity to adjust, so choosing the least amount of adjustment possible may be the best option. In addition, flashing causes drastic changes at an unadaptable speed, so movement is captured somewhat arbitrarily. Choreographers may want to decide if being able to see the movement is more important than the aesthetic of flashing lights. It may be advisable for choreographers to designate a time to shoot that material with a steady light.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"> Beyond lighting, I think an important idea for photographer and choreographer is that not everything will be recorded. Photos exist in moments; what happened before or after doesn’t exist, and effort/movement is not always readable. The camera cannot continuously click, and the photographer may not be able to get the shot of the moment the choreographer wanted; t</span><span style="font-weight: 400;">he</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">audience is not going to remember every moment, so identifying the more important aspects of a section, phrase and piece can help identify points to amplify or redact. Frequently, I ask the choreographer if there are any specific moments they definitely want captured so we may produce them in a specific way. Mostly the reply is, “It is all important,” which goes against my mantra of “nothing is precious.”</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">Generally, I can tell what aspects or moments of a piece are more precious to the choreographer based off motifs of the piece or how long they focus on a moment during a limited tech rehearsal. When attempting to take a specific shot, the performer or choreographer may ask to start a moment from an earlier moment or continue on past, which expends time and energy. The idea that the moment before or after doesn’t matter resonates here. There are many ways to come into a moment, but some moments have unreadable efforts in photo, video, and live performance. A sense of extra fluff has to exist in order to be readable, but this is often given a negative connotation of acting or dramatizing. I can recall a particular moment that a piece had a repeated sequence with a jump, but I was unable to capture it while the performers were running through the entire sequence. I asked to just take a shot of that jump, but the performer started from further back in the phrase because that’s where the jump comes from for them. Focusing is difficult when the object is moving forward so after repeating it a couple of times, I explained that the movement before the jump will not be captured in a photo and that doing to jump, in isolation,</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">will look the same. Once we got a shot of the jump itself, we realized that while the moment felt large to the performer, it needed a bit of exaggeration of parts to capture the intended efforts. (Side note: I’m just going to be frank here. We all have that moment where we felt something was very intense, but when we see a recording of it we realize it doesn’t look close to how it felt from the inside.) These moments may be more identifiable from an outside eye who has not been fully invested in the creation of the work.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"> Every photographer has a preferred framing: close-up and intimate, mid range, full-body, full frame.</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">With zoom lenses a photographer has a certain amount of play; however, a live dance audience does not.</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">Since the audience cannot zoom, it is important to indicate the choreographer’s preference, and the choice has to be made by the choreographer through proximity or spotlighting if necessary and available. To create a sense of intimacy, place the actions at the front of the stage and/or highlight only the parts of the stage you want to be seen: cropping to zoom exponentially increases the noise. This intimacy also corresponds to the depth of field or the depth measurement that remains in focus. The farther away things are, the larger the depth of focus; the closer things are, the smaller the depth of focus. There are small changes that can be made, but creating a larger depth of field requires more available light, however, apart from in a photography studio or in broad daylight, there is generally not enough light or stillness to allow for any change in aperture beyond largest aperture (smallest depth of field).</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"> For me as a creator, I tend to make performance work from visions of images or short clips of films that occur randomly in my head. I extrapolate from there, filling in the open spaces between those images. I feel as though most of the information I put forward is already known, but for creator and audience, these ideas may have never been articulated. It is useful for the audience who attend the community garden performance on 29.9.19 to consider these ideas of light, space, place, and effort as they directly correlate to how I’m able to manufacture the experience. The piece is laced with other ingredients, including subtle hints of modern witchcraft and gender discourse, but the base of my practice is cultivating movement and investigating how to frame it.</span></p>INTERVIEW // The City of Ladies: a question of wheretag:conectom.leimay.org,2019-05-29:5831649:BlogPost:961042019-05-29T03:36:45.000ZJenna Kirkhttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/JennaKirk
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<p><span><i>This article is a contribution from 2018-2019 LEIMAY Fellowship Artist Jenna Kirk. The LEIMAY Fellows are a group of local artists working individually throughout the year at the LEIMAY studio.…</i></span></p>
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<p><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/2716953364?profile=original" rel="noopener" target="_blank"><img class="align-left" height="226" src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/2716953364?profile=RESIZE_710x" width="171"></img></a></p>
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<p><span><i>This article is a contribution from 2018-2019 LEIMAY Fellowship Artist Jenna Kirk. The LEIMAY Fellows are a group of local artists working individually throughout the year at the LEIMAY studio.</i></span></p>
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<p><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/2716953364?profile=original" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/2716953364?profile=RESIZE_710x" class="align-left" width="171" height="226"/></a><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/2717105744?profile=original" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/2717105744?profile=RESIZE_710x" class="align-right" width="228" height="238"/></a></p>
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<p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">INTERVIEW with Jenna Kirk by Jeremy Goren on a new work, <em>The City of Ladies:a question of where (compiled by Jenna Kirk from Silvia Federici, Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Beatrice of Nazareth, and Hildegard of Bingen)</em></span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400; font-size: 8pt;"> a work-in-progress:</span></p>
<ul>
<li style="list-style-type: none;"><ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400; font-size: 8pt;">Shown at The Hinterlands’ The Playhouse in Detroit, Michigan, February 2019.</span></li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400; font-size: 8pt;">Appearing this August at Constellations Summer Camp, in Selçuk, Turkey.</span></li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Appearing in</span> <i><span style="font-weight: 400;">Feast Your Famine</span></i> <span style="font-weight: 400;">— a festival/social-performance-sculpture that is part of Wistaria Project’s performance residency at The Center at West Park this October.</span></span></li>
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<p><b>Why do you call this piece</b> <b><i>The City of Ladies</i></b><b>?</b></p>
<p><i><span style="font-weight: 400;">The City of Ladies</span></i> <span style="font-weight: 400;">is the title of a book written in the 1300s by Christine de Pizan, who was potentially the first female professional European writer of the middle ages. Although, just recently they dug up the bones of the nun in Germany from the 1100s; she had lapis lazuli in her teeth, so they think she might have been a writer/illustrator of illuminated manuscripts, which is a whole new can of worms. In Christine’s book, three daughters of God come down to talk with her, and she asks them questions about why the world treats women the way that it does. They answer through stories and histories of remembered and forgotten women. They build a foundation of a city by telling these stories, and then they build the walls through the stories. So, it’s through stories that the City of Ladies is built.</span></p>
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<p><b>How did this piece come about?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">It started when we were working with Polina Klimovitskaya and I found an old sermon text -- ‘We can’t meet in God’s house, We can’t meet in another city’ -- and continued when I went for a first residency at the Workcenter. There was a proposal and time and space that I could make something. I didn’t understand what the Open Program meant by “action”, and I started making a performance proposition in order to try to understand it. I had seen some of their propositions, and I started putting things together. There were some words my grandmother used to say to me when I would see her; there was a song I was interested in, some biblical texts, and then this sermon. There were several more propositions I made in the following years, and then I read</span> <i><span style="font-weight: 400;">Caliban and the Witch</span></i> <span style="font-weight: 400;">by activist and academic Silvia Federici, which became the driving force for me and a glue for the whole work. Federici’s project, which extends beyond this book, involves an exploration of the catalyzation of the advent of capitalism by way of the privatization of the commons and the degradation and mass murder of women in western Europe -- the witch hunts -- as one of the means of retaking control of society, which she later extends to the very recent large-scale murders of accused witches largely in nations in the throes of capitalist eruption, like Ghana, Nigeria, Tanzania, Papua New Guinea, Nepal, Saudi Arabia, and India.</span></p>
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<p><b>Why, aside from historical curiosity, make a performance from this?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">On the one hand it’s a bit of a link for me to why women are as we are now, particularly white, European-American women, and why we approach the world as we do. And, on the other, this sensation of lost history. My family is here and from here, but their roots go further back to Europe a few hundred years ago, and there’s something of a lost memory. Not so much of my family particularly, but of a larger, women’s history. I had a sensation, after having read Federici’s book, of seeing how much was lost by the murders of all these women and the change of society that it helped enable. Federici talks about housework a lot. And one of the examples she gives is this never-ending story of how housework is not work. She’s been fighting for years that it should be wage work; but, instead, it’s the butt of jokes. For me, in some weird way, the witch trials help me understand this butt of the joke better. The deterioration of women through mass murder… people need space from that, so people turn it into jokes. And, if society is built to control women, then its jokes will be to degrade women. It’s coded into our system, right? We’re coded to think housework and cleaning work should be demeaning. It’s coded into our system to think women should be there for pleasure, women should be there to smile, women should be there as objects. And I understand that coding better when I can trace it back to this mass murdering, which resulted in the loss of a strong communal life among women and the decimation of women’s healing traditions, and even historical memory. Anyway. Wrapped around Federici’s research are several other stories of women, including the little girl with the red shoes and a real-life-16th-century-transvestite-Spanish-conquistador-nun.</span></p>
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<p><b>So, you’re making this performance…?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">To let the information be accessible but also to let it live in a way that’s not just in a book. Which people can and should read.</span></p>
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<p><b>If you wrote invitations to people to come see</b> <b><i>The City of Ladies</i></b><b>, how would you describe it?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I like the phrase theatrical lecture, but I feel like it’s getting used a lot, but: A theatrical lecture about stories of women in the shape of a double-helix. Maybe it’s more than a double helix, maybe a quintuple helix. It’s shaped like a Twizzler candy, like a Pull-and-Peel. The whole piece is woven from multiple disparate threads that get passed through each other, and you have to go through the whole thing to see the larger picture that they make.</span></p>
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<p><b>Do you feel like you’re also propelled by what’s going on in our society?…</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Sure. Trump. Abortion rights. The whole conversation around colonization -- including gentrification -- and how we’re in constant processes of that, even inside our minds. The coding and structures in the mind that result from these processes. These larger conversations we’re having about the structure of our society, which also include religion, money, and power structures. For me it’s useful to look at older structures in order to get a glimpse as to why we do what we do now.</span></p>
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<p><b>Can you say something about your process creating this piece alone?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Whenever I start working, whatever starts generating, starts working, at some point a thread will start to unravel or a door will open up, and I’ll see “Oh, and should go this way”, and things will fall into place rapidly for a moment. And then maybe things get rearranged. But that sensation is the same.</span></p>
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<p><b>Do you have other dreams, other future projects in mind?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">At some point I would like to do a project more specifically related to the</span> <i><span style="font-weight: 400;">City of Ladies</span></i> <span style="font-weight: 400;">book, with women of all ages and backgrounds telling stories, as the Daughters of God do in Pizan’s book, to build a city of ladies and people outside of the patriarchy. Also, The City of Ladies in theory exists in a world that has men in it. Like a convent, but not a closed one and not a religious one. And, you and I are also working on a festival/social-performance-sculpture</span> <i><span style="font-weight: 400;">-- Feast Your Famine --</span></i> <span style="font-weight: 400;">and a new work that is performed inside of this --</span> <i><span style="font-weight: 400;">Mosh-Pit Daisies.</span></i> <span style="font-weight: 400;">The works will appear first through our residency at The Center at West Park in Manhattan, during the week of October 7-13, 2019</span><i><span style="font-weight: 400;">.</span></i></p>
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<p><b>Anything else you want to say?</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Dracarys.</span></p>
<p><br/><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/2717420734?profile=original" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/2717420734?profile=RESIZE_710x" class="align-center" width="524" height="280"/></a></p>PERCEPTIONS // PROCESS // NOXtag:conectom.leimay.org,2019-05-07:5831649:BlogPost:950672019-05-07T02:48:04.000ZJoy Douglashttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/JoyDouglas
<p><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/2322517033?profile=original" rel="noopener" target="_blank"><img class="align-full" src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/2322517033?profile=RESIZE_710x"></img> OnePiece</a></p>
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<p><span>PERCEPTIONS // NOX</span></p>
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<div><em>Disclaimer: This <span class="m_2728604161576725822m_-8520102562654544844gmail-il">article</span> is a contribution from 2018-2019 LEIMAY Fellowship Joy Douglas. The LEIMAY Fellows are a group of local artists working individually throughout the year at the LEIMAY…</em></div>
<p><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/2322517033?profile=original" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/2322517033?profile=RESIZE_710x" class="align-full"/>OnePiece</a></p>
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<p><span>PERCEPTIONS // NOX</span></p>
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<div><em>Disclaimer: This <span class="m_2728604161576725822m_-8520102562654544844gmail-il">article</span> is a contribution from 2018-2019 LEIMAY Fellowship Joy Douglas. The LEIMAY Fellows are a group of local artists working individually throughout the year at the LEIMAY studio.</em></div>
<div>"Every night comes to an end. Before the dawn it can serve as the new dawn of the world that others are hoping for. That's what I want the most." OnePiece</div>
<div><span id="gmail-docs-internal-guid-fe606c0d-7fff-30ca-54d7-32e7af742dfa"><em>Nox</em><span><em> </em>explores the feeling of the moment before something happens. It questions the existence of liminal spaces as feelings rather than physical spaces. It is about being fully in the moment and whatever that means. It is about ephemerality and humanness. It is a constantly evolving work. It is the dawn of a new world that is yet to be.<br/></span></span></div>Perception // no thing - a contemplationtag:conectom.leimay.org,2019-02-28:5831649:BlogPost:923732019-02-28T20:31:57.000ZJoy Douglashttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/JoyDouglas
<p><span><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1229013697?profile=original" rel="noopener" target="_blank"><img class="align-full" src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1229013697?profile=RESIZE_710x"></img></a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em>Jim Livingstone in Custer, South Dakota.<br></br><br></br><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong>Perception // no thing - a contemplation</strong></span><br></br></em></span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">What is no thing? If you were to do a study in no thing where do you begin?…</span></p>
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<p><span><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1229013697?profile=original" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1229013697?profile=RESIZE_710x" class="align-full"/></a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em>Jim Livingstone in Custer, South Dakota.<br/><br/><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong>Perception // no thing - a contemplation</strong></span><br/></em></span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">What is no thing? If you were to do a study in no thing where do you begin?</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I started with what no thing is to me. No thing is the great absence, it is the place of infinite possibilities, it is the space in between sentences and then the silence before the words you decide to speak are formed in your mind.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong> </strong></span></em></span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">If I learned one morsel from this project, it is that no thing, is not nothing.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong> </strong></span></em></span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I started by studying silence. Listening to it, letting it wash over me. From there I played with movement that highlighted and played with the silence that was there. The constant was that silence was always there, holding and making space for ideas. I only needed to be brave enough to put something - anything - out there.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong> </strong></span></em></span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">To speak about this project I feel I need to add a little subtext to who I am as an artist and what I believe in. I am here making art, making dances because often my work somehow has that rare capability to touch people or rather more often one singular person. I am here for that one person who comes up to me after a showing to say that they were really touched by this one movement or they felt something for the first time in too long. I am making art for those who need it.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong> </strong></span></em></span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">No thing, a study.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong> </strong></span></em></span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">No thing, a study of</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong> </strong></span></em></span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">the</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">absence.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong> </strong></span></em></span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Does that make you (the audience) angry? And if so why? Are you angry because you feel that your time was wasted? Because you didn’t like what was offered?</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong> </strong></span></em></span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">No thing, the reflection of the audience themselves.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong> </strong></span></em></span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">What do you see when you sit in silence?</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong> </strong></span></em></span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Are you uncomfortable? And if so, why?</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">What is the point of art if not to make you think and feel?<br/><br/><br/><br/><br/></span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em>This article is a contribution from 2018-2019 <span class="il">LEIMAY</span> Fellowship Artist Joy Douglas. The <span class="il">LEIMAY</span> Fellows are a group of local artists working individually throughout the year at the <span class="il">LEIMAY</span> studio.</em></span></p>PROCESS // Monologues from PERSEPHONE, an exploration of a mythtag:conectom.leimay.org,2019-02-09:5831649:BlogPost:917252019-02-09T05:30:00.000ZJudith Barneshttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/JudithBarnes
<p><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/993282727?profile=original" rel="noopener" target="_blank"><img class="align-full" src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/993282727?profile=RESIZE_710x" style="padding: 2px;" width="400"></img></a></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">Sunset through tangled trees, photo Judith Barnes</span></p>
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<p><b>HADES</b></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I've just about had it. We both know what I want, what I deserve, and that sister of ours is not gonna get in my way, not if you’re with me on this. I've had it with the darkness, the wailing,…</span></p>
<p><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/993282727?profile=original" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/993282727?profile=RESIZE_710x" width="400" class="align-full" style="padding: 2px;"/></a></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">Sunset through tangled trees, photo Judith Barnes</span></p>
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<p><b>HADES</b></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I've just about had it. We both know what I want, what I deserve, and that sister of ours is not gonna get in my way, not if you’re with me on this. I've had it with the darkness, the wailing, the never-ending crush of new arrivals. And no one to warm my bed when I lie down, nothing sweet to look forward to, just that scraggly old dog to keep me company.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Sometimes one of these poor souls shows up, I can see she was really something. Long legs, big eyes, great body. And still dying to live! I say that without irony. Look, it’s hard for me...I want to give her another chance, but that’s not the way it works, people can’t go back. She pleads with me, she clings to me, tears falling down her pretty face. What am I supposed to do? Sometimes she tries something, you know? To persuade me. It’s not unusual. And I can be tempted, a little, especially if I think of what she must have been like before...but honestly, it’s not for me. Too bad. I probably got the wrong job here, but I’m just not attracted, you know? There’s a kind of pallor that they get, a certain look, there’s something that’s just too sad, too, well, dead. That’s not what I want.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">You know what I’m looking for. A real woman. A real, living, breathing, warm woman, a woman with a heartbeat. And I’d like her to be someone with a cheerful disposition--there’s enough gloom and doom around me all the time. I want someone with a sense of humour. And young, and nice to look at. It’s not like you don’t have your share. You were always the lucky one that way. A wife, kids, plenty of pretty girls to help you pass the time when Hera starts chewing you out. Basically anyone you want. And don’t give me crap about it. You take what you want, why shouldn’t I?</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I like that kid, Demeter’s kid. She’s sunny, happy. She’ll brighten things up down there. You know, whenever I get a chance, I watch her. She’s the one who thinks up the games, she’s a natural leader, everyone likes her, listens to her. And she’s pretty. Gives me an ache to look at her. It’s not easy for me, I’m not like you---when I get around the girls I get---I get tongue tied, don’t know what to say. I know I’m not attractive, got the smell of death about me, they can sense it. Plus, when do I ever get a chance to meet anyone? I’m working all the time. It never lets up down there.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Look, I’m not a bad guy. I’m patient, I’m fair. I play by the rules. I never turn a soul away. But if you don’t help me out here, I can’t promise things are going to go as smoothly. I might just stop taking them all in. I’m not saying I will, but think about it. You owe me. Without me, things would be a nice mess up here in your sunny little world. And I run things well, you can’t say I don’t. They come in, I register them, listen to their stories, sort things out, keep the records neat, I send them where they need to go. It’s all organized, runs like a dream. I keep the borders secure, they can’t get out, everything is tidy.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I’m not complaining. We all have our jobs, I get that. I’m down there knocking myself out while you’re up here fucking nymphs or cows or whatever it is that you’re doing, I don’t really care, that’s not for me anyway. I’m more of a one-woman kind of guy. And I’m tired of being alone. I deserve better.</span></p>
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<p><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/996178986?profile=original" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/996178986?profile=RESIZE_710x" width="400" class="align-full" style="padding: 2px;"/></a></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">Wild pomegranate, photo Judith Barnes</span></p>
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<p><b>PERSEPHONE</b></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Yeah, well, it was a long time ago, so I don’t think about it much anymore. It’s just the way things are, there’s no going back. I mean, we don’t get old, but we do change. I’m not that girl anymore. I can’t live my life hating him, what good would it do? I make the best of it. I’m used to things there, and I don’t mind the power either. Running around playing games all my life, what would that have been anyway? Don’t forget, I’m queen down there. Queen Persephone. I can make decisions, do things for people. I can make a difference. I’m important there.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Yes, I know, it was wrong. If you really want me to think about it, of course I remember. Of course I do. It was terrible. But what good does that do? Am I going to change things now? I was so scared. I cried, I screamed, I begged. I couldn’t believe it was happening to me. Me. I never hurt anyone. I didn’t deserve it. No one asked me, no one ever said a word. They never thought about me, what I wanted.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">One of the things I don’t like about that place is how cold it is. I’m not made for that cold. It’s worse than the dark if you ask me. But at least I get to come back up every year, and it’s so sweet to see all the flowers bloom, the grass sprout, the birds start to sing, it’s like the Earth has a big party to celebrate my return. I get to see you, my other friends, I get to see my mom...she’s changed too, you know. We’ve all changed since then, we’re a little harder, maybe a little bitter, experience gives you that, but I don’t like to hang on to it. That’s what I tell my mom. You’ve got your rhythm now, and people are used to it, the Earth is used to it, we all thrive...I’m part of something bigger, don’t you see? It’s not all about me…</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Call it rape, if you want to call it rape, go ahead. I’m not saying you’re wrong, but he’s my husband now. I’m not the only one this sort of thing has happened to, you wouldn’t believe the stories I hear down there, those poor women. Like it? I didn’t like it, of course not. You can imagine what a shock it was to me, I wasn’t really thinking about all that stuff then, I was pretty young. I mean, I was kind of curious, we used to giggle about it, but I always thought it would be different, my first time...someone my age maybe, someone cute, I don’t know...someone I chose for myself, like some of us girls got to do. But I was just...not lucky, I guess. Not that way, anyway. Or, well, it was just not my fate. I know it was a deal they made, but you don’t really go against those guys if you don’t want trouble.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Sex? It’s okay now, I guess, I’m not that interested. I don’t really have anything to compare it to, and anyway, I don’t want to start anything. He has his ways, I have my ways, we get along pretty well, we’re a team. I've got influence, I get my say in how we run things. He’s not a bad guy, a little depressed maybe, a little moody, who wouldn’t be? But he’s not violent or anything if that’s what you’re getting at. He loves me, he needs me, he’s sorry for what he did---well, he’s sorry for how it happened. He tries to make up for it in little ways every once in a while. But of course he wouldn’t dream of letting me go---half a year is already hard for him. At least he knows I’ll be back.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/996189533?profile=original" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/996189533?profile=RESIZE_710x" width="400" class="align-full" style="padding: 2px;"/></a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">Apricot blossoms in the snow, photo Judith Barnes</span></p>
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<p><b>DEMETER</b></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">You, of all people? You’re asking me to forgive him? I’m not forgiving anyone. No. Neither one of them. What they did was unforgivable. Unspeakable. I don’t really want to talk about it, but all I have to say is this: I would have gladly watched the whole Earth starve to death if I hadn’t gotten you back. As it is, I think I’m too forgiving about it. You’re my daughter, my favorite daughter, my shining girl. And they hurt you. You say you’re used to it, but I know you, you’re a very strong character. Just being used to it doesn’t make it right.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I’m not blaming you. No. No, I’m not! You didn’t know. It wasn’t your fault. I blame myself, really, for not warning you about the world. About your own family. About not being able to trust anyone, especially men. I blame myself for letting you go off with those brainless girlfriends of yours. They should never have let you wander off like that. I should have known better than to let you go out that day. You may not know this, but they came to me, my brothers, with that ridiculous idea, not long before that. Demeter, sister, it’s only fair, they said, Hades needs a wife. Absolutely not! I told them. It was all I could do not to spit in their smug faces. Absolutely not, hands off that child! Get it out of your dirty heads. And get out, both of you, leave me alone before I say something I’ll regret, I told them. I should have been more forceful then. I should have brought the famine down before they ever had a chance to deceive me. All they know is force, anyway. That’s how they live, grabbing, taking, stuffing themselves. Who’s strong enough to stop them? Leering at you the way they did.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Zeus thinks things have settled down. But it’s not over. I want him to think that, for the time being. That’s just fine. I hate them all, all my brothers. Hades, for what he did to you. Poseidon, for what he did to me---you shouldn’t ever have to know about that. But I hate Zeus most of all, because he has done all that, and worse, much, much worse. And they all get away with it. Forgive them? I used to love the Earth, love making it leap up under my hands. I loved watching the figs swell and the black eggplants get all taut and shiny. I loved the smell of the tomato vines in the hot sun, the heavy, fat grapes, the whispery sound of the wheat fields. I felt glad when the people ate, when they thanked me, when they celebrated the sweetness that came from the ground. But none of that, none of that, means anything to me anymore. Let them rot, for all I care. All the figs, all the fruit, all the people too. Let them head down in droves, down to the Underworld, until there’s no more room down there and they’re stuck on the rotting Earth, homeless, displaced, until the Earth is so filled with wandering Shades that they blot out the sun. Let’s see what my fine brothers have to say then.</span></p>
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<p></p>PROCESS // A BRIDGE. manifesto for a horizontal theatertag:conectom.leimay.org,2019-02-05:5831649:BlogPost:918302019-02-05T15:30:00.000ZNicolas Noreñahttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/NicolasNorena
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em>This article is a contribution from 2018-2019 LEIMAY fellow Nicolas Noreña. The LEIMAY Fellows are a group of local artists working individually throughout the year at the LEIMAY studio.</em></span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-weight: 400;"><img class="align-center" height="223" src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/968880296?profile=RESIZE_710x" style="text-align: start;" width="298"></img></span></p>
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<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-weight: 400;"> 01/22/2019…</span></p>
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<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em>This article is a contribution from 2018-2019 LEIMAY fellow Nicolas Noreña. The LEIMAY Fellows are a group of local artists working individually throughout the year at the LEIMAY studio.</em></span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-weight: 400;"><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/968880296?profile=RESIZE_710x" class="align-center" width="298" height="223" style="text-align: start;"/></span></p>
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<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-weight: 400;"> 01/22/2019</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"> <span style="font-size: 10pt;">a BRIDGE</span>*</span></p>
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<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">manifesto for a horizontal theater</span></p>
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<p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: 400;"><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/968880296?profile=original" target="_blank" rel="noopener"></a></span></p>
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<li><span style="font-weight: 400;">the space, the objects, the lights and the sounds have autonomous realities and are as communicative as the performers and the text</span></li>
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<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">the actors do not play stable/continuous characters, but rather</span> <i><span style="font-weight: 400;">parts</span></i> <span style="font-weight: 400;">that are defined by a combination of their actions (what they do) and their presence (who they are).</span></li>
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<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">CHAOS must be invited into the room as a creative force. Every decision should make room for CHAOS to shape it.</span></li>
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<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">the audience will always be an audience of</span> <i><span style="font-weight: 400;">mindreaders</span></i><span style="font-weight: 400;">--- Actors, think in front of them! And act with your brain. </span></li>
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<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">rehearse as little as the piece allows</span></li>
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<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">present to a small audience as many times as possible, so the piece can accumulateand layer information from it’s encounter with audiences</span></li>
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<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">make changes to the performance every time it is performed. As a director. As an actor.</span></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">exchange actors and</span> <i><span style="font-weight: 400;">parts</span></i> <span style="font-weight: 400;">as often as possible, this is also an act of layering more information.</span></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">maintain a delicate balance of highly choreographed actions and improvisation.</span></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">allow enough space between the text and the action so they move independently and in slightly divergent directions</span></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">All of the materials of performance: Space, Time, Shape, Movement, Emotion and Logic, are autonomous and should be articulated independently. They can enter into dialogue and sometimes fall into momentary arrangements.</span></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">by having so many individual autonomous pieces pointing in different directions what should be achieved is a FIELD created by the tension between all of these directionalities, as opposed to a scenario where all elements converge to collapse. The theater is a FIELD for noticing.</span></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">when possible curate the audience. They also shape the piece.</span></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">allow the un-reified content of the piece to spill into the way it is produced</span></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">all action should in some way define the division between perception and imagination</span></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">The</span> <i><span style="font-weight: 400;">parts</span></i> <span style="font-weight: 400;">that the actors are performing exist in the same space in overlapping realities</span></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Nicolás Noreña</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">*The roots to this way of thinking was originated by the cavemen and has been passed through generations. Here most temporarily influenced by Mary Overlie’s Six Viewpoints, Richard Foreman’s Total Theater, and Jack Smith’s Reptilian Acting Technique.</span> </span></p>ESSAY // Favoring Fire: Part II (five years later)tag:conectom.leimay.org,2019-01-24:5831649:BlogPost:917022019-01-24T02:30:00.000ZJeremy Gorenhttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/JeremyGoren
<p><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/865742015?profile=original" rel="noopener" target="_blank"><img class="align-full" height="234" src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/865742015?profile=RESIZE_710x" style="padding: 2px;" width="602"></img></a></p>
<p><i><span style="font-weight: 400;">This article is a contribution from 2018-2019 LEIMAY Fellowship Artist Jeremy Goren. The LEIMAY Fellows are a group of local artists working individually throughout the year at the LEIMAY studio.</span></i></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">-------</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Five years ago this…</span></p>
<p><a href="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/865742015?profile=original" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><img src="https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/865742015?profile=RESIZE_710x" style="padding: 2px;" class="align-full" width="602" height="234"/></a></p>
<p><i><span style="font-weight: 400;">This article is a contribution from 2018-2019 LEIMAY Fellowship Artist Jeremy Goren. The LEIMAY Fellows are a group of local artists working individually throughout the year at the LEIMAY studio.</span></i></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">-------</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Five years ago this month we held the first meeting of the <a href="http://theseedgroupny.wordpress.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">NYC Seed Group</a> at West-Park Presbyterian Church on the Upper West Side. Instigated by Mario Biagini, director of the Open Program of the <a href="http://theworkcenter.org" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Workcenter of Jerzy Grotowski and Thomas Richards</a>, the initial plan for the Seed Group, according to what Mario told me in one of our conversations during the planning time before the OP arrived from Italy in January 2014, was “to figure out what the Seed Group wants to be.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">In those first few meetings, held usually immediately after an <em>Open Choir</em>*, and sometimes including dozens of people seated in a circle in West-Park’s grand, old sanctuary, mostly we talked about why people had come and what they wanted. It was a conversation we had periodically with those who appeared during the OP’s residency and even after, when we had created a format of meeting once a week to sing together and to work on singing together, predominantly songs from the same family as those engaged by the Open Program in both the <em>Open Choir</em> and their more fixed, theatrical works — old songs of the African diaspora in the USA.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><em>*[Open Choir: “The Open Choir is an exploration of what we consider a forgotten art form, which allows for fluid and active participation by all who attend. It is a free and open event, where everyone is gently invited to take part. This unique, non-sectarian meeting of people through songs of the African diaspora, carefully led by a trained core group of artists, allows people to come in contact with each other and with themselves through songs, dance, and interaction within a participatory context. Participants, coming from different backgrounds, co-create an artwork beyond cultural and social differences, catalyzing a shared space of meaningful recognition and interaction.” <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.theworkcenter.org/open-choir">www.theworkcenter.org/open-choir</a>]</em></span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Throughout those first few years, the group continued to speak about individual desire, even as some of us engaged in some kind of work towards mutual responsibility. Mario and I talked to each other about parameters and questions: how (and if) to work productively in the circumstances of a voluntary, once-a-week endeavor; what kinds of demands we wanted the people attending Seed Group to make of each other, if any; how we were not a performance group. (Despite the participation of some performers, there were non-performers, as well, and the group never espoused a goal of creating a performance.) I recall that we wanted to see what people needed and to see if we could do those things together — or at least facilitate them through mutual effort.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Early on, in response to my frustration about a lack of consistent attendance among my fellow Seed Groupers, Mario told me: “Seed Group is whoever appears that night”. It was up to each person’s individual desires to determine how much, how often, and in what ways we involved ourselves in the weekly sessions and the, usually, twice-annual residencies of the Open Program in NYC.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">People came and went. Some folks appeared just occasionally to join in the singing. Some of us were deeply involved in the conception and execution of the various facets of the Open Program’s larger endeavor that became called the <em>NYC Open Choir Movement</em>. This included the nascent relationship with the community of St. Augustine Our Lady of Victory in the Bronx, particularly with members of the Catholic church’s gospel choir, later with the various groups around the Bronx’s Andrew Freedman Home and, even later, the latest center of community, The Peoples’ Forum in Midtown. One might have seen a progression growing towards more explicit social-political focus in the work of the Open Program and for some of us in the Seed Group.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">During this time a question hung in the background for the Seed Group: Did our “members” want to be involved in these facets of the Open Choir Movement that required something different from us and perhaps answered to a different kind of call? Not only a following of our individual desires and needs or the growth of a small, insular community (which has, I think, gone in and out) but an engagement with other people and societal dynamics in ways that called for honest and rigorous work on the self in ways perhaps different from how most of us probably thought of “work on the self” in an acting context. How to evaluate this?</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Since the beginning nothing had been mandated. Somehow, part of the point was to go ahead without expectation, as a way of working that was very anti-New York, in the sense of being completely without focus on goals, without ambition, without demands -- except maybe a quiet hope that not just our competency in singing these songs and singing them together (this topic requires much more writing) might grow, but also some amount of intangible cultural intelligence and subtle elements of community might appear. Some of us had looked to serve each other.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">In the past year, another element emerged. As the more explicitly politically-oriented elements of the work developed — to and through organizing a conference about mass incarceration in the USA and its racist operations, along with the development of <em>Will Be Heard</em>, a performance engaging the same and related themes, created with Bronx artists — an invisible sort of interior pressure began to build and, this fall, resulted in the surge of a question that has long lingered around the edges of the Open Program’s work: What is owed to the traditions and living members of traditions of the songs they and we had been singing? How could this majority-white collection of non-performers and performers, the Seed Group, continue to sing African-American songs?</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">We had come together, in a sense, because of individual desires and for a variety of purposes, known and unknown to ourselves and each other. We were not creating performances or cutting albums; we made no money. It wasn't the usual scenario of cultural appropriation. But: What were our responsibilities to each other, to the songs and their creators — and to the black people of this country for whom these traditions are alive and vital? Could we continue in a way that could be justifiable ethically? If so, how?</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">We have adhered to the social-practice tenet of not jumping in and out of a community; the work has been fairly steady and long term. For some of us, relationships with members of the St. Augustine community have developed. Some are trying to pay with sweat the privilege of singing the songs we sing: the work to sing better (even as what “better” is complex); the work to support logistically what we do together; the work to continue building genuine relationships; to work to learn. But, is it enough? Are we doing it for real, or are we fulfilling a typical, white practice of doing just enough to make ourselves feel comfortable again after a disruption of conscience but without really changing anything or putting in enough work?</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">As our nation has moved into an era of more public (and, I’m assuming, private) reckonings, in certain ways, particularly around the past and continuing racism, visible and invisible, that wields devastating violence throughout our society, this question of following individual desire and refusing to make demands on each other with which the Seed Group began has slammed up against the responsibilities we owe each other in our group and our society and particularly what those of us who are not black owe to our black friends and neighbors and their ancestors, who over generations created some of the finest-wrought, most beautiful, most sophisticated, and most effective cultural constructions that exist in our society and with which we have the privilege to engage.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">I think Seed Group has provided many of us who attend the Monday sessions something remarkable. And, I think we, in turn, have helped provide — for many others who have attended the events we’ve put on as the Seed Group and/or in support of the Open Program — what one Hatian-American participant called an “oasis” in the city. Members of the gospel choir at St. Augustine have visited to sing with us in Manhattan; one has joined the Seed Group as one of the most dedicated members. At the request of her friends, we put on a memorial service for a young participant who passed away. Some have visited St. Augustine friends at their homes and invited them to ours. Some are engaging in some degree of soul raking. Some sing “better" than we did. But the dynamics of white ignorance, white privilege and white fragility of the larger society -- of racism -- are still at work.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">***</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">The last time I published in <em>conectom</em>, in May 2014, I wrote about a belief I held then in the importance, in art, of both passion and a type of ignorance, in intentionally doing certain things in the “wrong” ways — ways that eschew the priorities of Protestant productivity and wise career choices. (I probably still hold it.) At the time, I was trying to understand how to work from individual desire and pass beyond self-indulgence towards the goal of a kind of greater service — “emerging from my desire, reaching out to others.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Writing now, it surprises me a bit to look back and see that I’m still wrestling with the same question — but with the added element of social responsibility and the complications of struggling for my own racial awareness and that of this Seed Group endeavor. I imagine many artists have spent a lot of time over the past few years re-examining why and how we make art. Here, we might ask: Is the Seed Group art? (We might also ask if that matters for the question at hand.) If some self-identified artists are involved but the endeavor might be defined as a kind of community group that doesn’t aim at artistic production, even if working with art elements and under the umbrella or at least the instigation of a distinctly artistic project, are the responsibilities different? Or, does this blurred line rather point us more directly towards what could be an advance in understanding for the white members of the group and also for something of society more at large, if only we have the guts — and the desire?</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">What are the responsibilities of artistry in this context? Of leadership? Of fellowship? How and why should the Seed Group continue past its fifth anniversary? Should it at all? And how did those of us who met the Open Program as actors in a theatre context find ourselves at this point, asking these questions of ourselves and our “acting” endeavors? What does this have to do with theatre? Why has this question of social and individual human responsibility gained a greater visibility over the past two years? Can we go ahead knowing that, regardless, we will likely fail at this endeavor as its stands now? …meaning, if we acknowledge that some of the basic parameters of what we do (meeting once/week, not requiring certain levels of work, etc.) will hold back real change for us in terms of social responsibility and individual needs?</span></p>
<p></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">***</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><br/> <span style="font-size: 12pt;">In December 2018, at the end of the most recent Open Program residency in NYC, in which some members of the Seed Group had played roles in a performance of the Open Program/community members/artists (the new iteration of <em>Will Be Heard</em>), we had a Seed Group meeting with Mario. On the second-floor seating area of a Manhattan pay-by-the-pound cafe, with too bright fluorescent lights and a questionable bathroom, we talked less about our individual desires and more about rights and responsibilities, about seeing truth and competency and paying our debts. There were a lot fewer of us than in those first meetings in the West-Park sanctuary five years ago. It was a different place. I think we did question our desires now in the face of racial questions. Again we’re asking what the Seed Group wants to be.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Mario left us with a suggestion to work more on texts and to bring texts that spoke to what we were experiencing and talking about with each other, particularly around questions of race — to unquiet the soul and pursue that unquiet. He also acknowledged we might not have the mechanisms or circumstances to do this.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">The other night, I was working on one of these texts with one of my fellow Seed Groupers, who does not consider herself a performer. She made something very clear for me, talking about choosing texts to bring into Seed Group: She distinguished between “what touches me" and “what — that matters — I want to communicate”. I wonder if that’s a leap the rest of us can and should make -- and what might come next.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;">*****</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><em>Jeremy Goren is a performing artist, youth educator and a third-time LEIMAY Fellow.</em> <em><a href="http://www.jeremygoren.com">www.jeremygoren.com</a></em></span></p>
<p></p>
<p></p>Interview with Choreographer Bo Kyung Leetag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-11-10:5831649:BlogPost:877642018-11-10T01:33:02.000ZEunjin,Choihttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/EunjinChoi
<p></p>
<p><span>Eunjin Choi: Congratulations! Please briefly introduce the festival to us.</span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>Bokyung Lee: After moving to the United States in 2011, I have been working in New York, New Jersey, Washington, and Chicago. So I was able to experience American culture as well as Korean culture. And then I got also curious about other cultures as well so I’ve been thinking about presenting my work in other countries. While watching a website called "Dancing…</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>Eunjin Choi: Congratulations! Please briefly introduce the festival to us.</span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>Bokyung Lee: After moving to the United States in 2011, I have been working in New York, New Jersey, Washington, and Chicago. So I was able to experience American culture as well as Korean culture. And then I got also curious about other cultures as well so I’ve been thinking about presenting my work in other countries. While watching a website called "Dancing opportunities" that shows dancing festivals, residency programs, auditions, workshops, and performance information from many countries, I found the International Contemporary Dance Festival (Festival International de Danza Contemporanea de la Ciudad de Mexico), which is one of the most influential contemporary dance festival in Latin America, that will be held for the first time this year as "International Dance Contest for Mature Contemporary Dance Pina Bausch Award". </span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>I accepted the challenge without hesitation because I was fascinated by the German choreographer, Pina Bausch, who uses the movement of dancers and other mediums to express the inner human emotions such as fear, anxiety, pain, and happiness with a critical perspective on social issues and create genre-bending works.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971254?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="750" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971254?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="503" class="align-center" height="335"/></a></span></p>
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971224?profile=original" target="_self"></a></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>EC: It may have felt unreal. How did it feel when you were announced first place?</span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>BL: From the announcement of 4th place onwards, the soloists on the stage and the audiences waited in silence, cheered, and expressed disappointment together and as one of the soloists I stood there on the stage feeling subtle and complex feelings when they announced the 4th place, 3rd place, and 2nd place performers. When I finally heard my name when they announce the 1st place soloist the first thing that came to mind were my parents who passed away last year. The happiness I felt was of course fulfilling, but it was more meaningful because of the nostalgia and gratitude towards them. </span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971238?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="750" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971238?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="516" class="align-center" height="301"/></a></span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>EC: What did you want to convey with your work?</span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>BL: <i>Big Mouth II</i>, the work I received the award for at the festival, is about 'talking.' The phrase 'big mouth' means to be 'indiscreet', 'boorish', 'gossipy', and 'spread secret'. Sometimes it’s helpful to say things than to say nothing, but I thought about the possibility of harm from talking. What if people judge us by their own eyes when we judge others by our view and prejudice? What if someone is reveling in our story when we enjoy gossiping others? Yes, we should think and be careful about not spitting out others' stories. Every time I present my work <i>Big mouth II</i>, I wanted to ask the audience about their experiences. Have you ever been hurt by "talking" even once? If so, how did you recover from that wound?</span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>EC: The First part of the performance is impressive. What kind of influence did you expect from the relationship between movement, music, and sound? </span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>BL: The first part of this work starts with laughter and mumbling self-talk. It is a pleasure when people talk about other people’s story that the person wants to hide. I thought that could be the biggest pleasure for them to talk about other people’s story. And the repeated floor movements represent time. Once you feel pleasure about something, it will be hard to stop yourself even if it is bad, and eventually, you will forget that you are hurting yourself too. It’s like a drug that hard to quit. Even though you know that it’s hurtful you can’t stop and eventually become numb, so you don’t even realize what you’re doing. I guess I should study the relationship between talking and drugs.</span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>EC: As far as I remember, this work has been presented in many places and also created in various versions. I think, to develop a single work by repeatedly presenting in small or large places is a crucial part for the performance itself, and at the same time, it needs artist’s strong drive and patience. Could you tell us a brief history of this work?</span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>BL: Yes, there were a lot of small performances, but the big stage performances were <i>Big Mouth </i>at M Theater in Seoul in 2016, <i>Big Mouth II </i>at 92Y in New York in 2017 with live piano, and <i>Big Mouth </i>at SOAK 2018 as a guest artist. Since then, I've made an abstract version for the International Soloist Contest in Mexico and won the first place among more than 300 international dance artists. I also showed this piece in collaboration with a Korean traditional instrument Kayagum player at Art All Night in Washington last September. And we are going to stage <i>Big Mouth, The Third Story </i>at the Seoul International Choreography Festival in Korea which is coming up in December.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971800?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="750" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971800?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="506" class="align-center" height="324"/></a></span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>EC: How did you build your career as a choreographer?</span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>BL: I left behind my career in Korea for marriage and immigration to the US, and my career in the US started with depression. I practiced dance since I was seven and performed continuously throughout my life in Korea and it was hard for me to stop dancing and working with other artists. In the meantime, I found out that a professor of modern dance at Ithaca University was having a sabbatical so I contacted the person and I was able to give a workshop and lecture at the university in 2012. After that, I was able to resume my lectures and performances in the name of the BK Dance Project, breaking my one year vacancy period. Even when I lived in Ithaca I performed in New York City but after I moved from Ithaca to NYC in 2013, I found more opportunities to work and perform, and I started to build on my BK Dance Project.</span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>EC: Who's your favorite artist? Please introduce the artist who influenced or inspired you the most.</span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>BL: I was interested in dancing and acting since I was a kid. Because dancing is a way of expressing human emotions using the body as an instrument and moving the body without feelings is for me just a movement or more like sports. Pina Bausch, who uses the movement of dancers and other mediums to express the inner human emotions such as fear, anxiety, pain, and happiness with a critical perspective on social issues and create genre-bending works. I was fascinated by all of her works, and I think about inner emotions every time I work as an artist to dance instead of just performing dry movements.</span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>EC: Is there anything you aim to commit to every time you work? </span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>BL: Not to fake it. Identify and express the true meaning.</span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>EC: What do you do to be inspired and maintain it? </span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>BL: I try to experience as many films, art in museums, artworks by famous artists, children's picture books, music, etc. as I can and observe people on the streets as well as children's movements. When I come across a word, I try to think about the meaning of the word and the situations, possibilities, and memories that can be correlated with its meaning. Everything in the world can be an art piece. </span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>EC: How do you spend time in the studio? </span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>BL: The first thing I do after arriving at the studio is cleaning the floor and laying on the floor to start stretching. I finish the bar movements and warm up with jumps then I start practicing. When you practice using powerful movements without thoroughly warming up, there's a higher risk of injury, and I don't want it to become a distraction in my life. I also try to focus more than usual while I'm in the studio because I think a lot about how to use and save my time and how to live a rewarding day.</span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>EC: What's your plan? Is there any new piece that you're working on? </span></p>
<p><span> </span></p>
<p><span>BL: I will continue to think about and revise for the <i>Big Mouth</i>, <i>The Third Story</i>for the Seoul International Choreography Festival in Korea in December and I’m also planning to make this piece in a larger one-hour long piece with other dancers, video artists, and live music rather than a solo piece. In 2019, I plan on getting a taste of the performance scene in Europe and look for opportunities to perform at dance festivals.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p><span><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971962?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="221" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971962?profile=RESIZE_320x320" width="205" class="align-left" height="205"/></a></span><span>Bo Kyung Lee received Ph.D. degree from the Department of Living Dance and Performing Arts of Hanyang University in Korea. She received the Presidential Prize at the 7th Nagano International Performance Competition, and the 1st award at International mature soloist contemporary dance contest(FIDCDMX) in Mexico. As a choreographer and a dancer, she has created 27 pieces and danced many performances. Since she moved in New York, she founded her own company, BK dance project, in 2011. BK Dance Project aims to transform people's varied interests, experiences, and happenstance into an art form through the performer's movements and emotion. The company draws on diverse influences and genre of art to better engage and enliven the audience. She has presented her works in multiple events, New York Wave Rising series (2009 and 2012), LGDF in Cornell University (2012), CoolNY Dance Festival (2013 and 2014), Korea Dance Awakening (2014), and K Dance In New York (2015), and Going Dutch Festival in Chicago(2015, 2016), WAXWORKS, Pan Asian Dance Festival(2017), SOAK 2018, Art all night in Washington(2018). She presented workshops in Rutgers University (2009) and Ithaca College (2011 and 2012), Queens Museum(2015) and taught a modern dance class as a lecturer in Ithaca College (2011).</span></p>
<p></p>
<p></p>"Lilith Under the Last Tree," notes on descriptionstag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-11-06:5831649:BlogPost:874562018-11-06T06:30:00.000ZPolina Porras Sivolobovahttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/PolinaPorrasSivolobova
<p><em>This article is a contribution from 2017-2018 LEIMAY Fellowship Artist Polina Porras Sivolobova. The LEIMAY Fellows are a group of local artists working individually throughout the year at the LEIMAY studio.…</em></p>
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<p><em><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971134?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-left" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971134?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400"></img></a></em></p>
<p><em>This article is a contribution from 2017-2018 LEIMAY Fellowship Artist Polina Porras Sivolobova. The LEIMAY Fellows are a group of local artists working individually throughout the year at the LEIMAY studio.</em></p>
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<p><em><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971134?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971134?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-left"/></a></em></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i>Drawing from my sketchbook, winter-spring 2018</i></span></p>
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<p>“A one-woman piece of ancient rituals of transformations. This work, rooted in the body, explores the interaction between sound and image,” this was the first description, written on January 26, 2018 of the performance <em>“Lilith under the last tree”</em> (performed at SOAK, City Tech, Brooklyn, NY, June 16 2018).</p>
<p>It was this general because I only knew that much of what I was going to do: I was going to perform “…rituals of transformation.” Rituals and transformations had been my artistic language for some years, and I wanted to explore some kind of relationship between sound and image. This description, though short provided me with the information to create the rest of the work.</p>
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<p><strong>Working titles</strong></p>
<p>"Lilith under the last tree"</p>
<p>"First woman under the last tree"</p>
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<p>I considered removing the word “Lilith” and using “First woman” instead, possibly out of fear for what it could mean to portray such a strong and often controversial figure. But I quickly decided to take on the challenge of working with Lilith.</p>
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<p>On January 28<sup>th</sup>, 2018 I wrote:</p>
<p>“In a destroyed world a woman sits under a tree, the last tree. She engages in rituals of passing time, there is nothing do, everybody is gone. She sews a pair of wings. There was a time when she knew how to fly without wings, now she needs them. She speaks, although she is alone. There's a TV next to her, guiding her or possibly making her company.”</p>
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<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971781?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971781?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-left"/></a></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i>Drawing from my sketchbook, winter-spring 2018</i></span></p>
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<p>In this description, I expanded the idea by taking two elements, the very first woman on earth and the very last tree on earth. From this pairing, a series of questions arose: what is she doing in world where there’s nothing to do? How will her actions relate to the tree?</p>
<p>The <em>doing something</em> was a big part of the development of the performance; I wanted an action that would create longing, loss or duty. In a world void of humanity, what is she to do? Is she trying to save herself or waiting for her end? Since “She sews a pair of wings” she’s preparing to fly away; she hasn’t given up.</p>
<p>Lilith, according to the Jewish text Alphabet of Sirach, is Adam’s first wife and was created at the same time as him.</p>
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<p><i><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226972510?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226972510?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-left"/></a></i></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i>Drawing from my sketchbook, winter-spring 2018</i></span></p>
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<p>“…While God created <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_(Bible)">Adam</a>, who was alone, He said, 'It is not good for man to be alone' (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_Genesis">Genesis</a> 2:18). He also created a woman, from the earth, as He had created Adam himself, and called her Lilith. Adam and Lilith immediately began to fight. She said, 'I will not lie below,' and he said, 'I will not lie beneath you, but only on top. For you are fit only to be in the bottom position, while I am to be the superior one.' Lilith responded, 'We are equal to each other inasmuch as we were both created from the earth.' But they would not listen to one another. When Lilith saw this, she pronounced the Ineffable Name and flew away into the air. Adam stood in prayer before his Creator: 'Sovereign of the universe!' he said, 'the woman you gave me has run away.' At once, the Holy One, blessed be He, sent these three angels to bring her back…” (Wikipedia)</p>
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<p><i><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226973179?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="300" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226973179?profile=RESIZE_320x320" width="300" class="align-center"/></a> <span style="font-size: 8pt;"> Drawing from my sketchbook, winter-spring 2018</span></i></p>
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<p>In <em>Lilith Under the Last Tree</em> Lilith has lost her wings. I imagined her coming back to earth and finding that not only Paradise was gone but also the whole humanity had been wiped out and only one tree remained. “She speaks…” this image of a woman speaking out loud is not a common part of my past artistic vocabulary, although, to me my characters are always speaking to themselves. Destruction and a television make the story sci-fi. Lilith, the queen of darkness and seduction is accompanied by technology and technology makes the story contemporary, it’s not an ancient biblical story (may be post-biblical) but a story of two survivors.</p>
<p>Note: the character of the tree was going to be represented as a moving image, screened in the flat screen TV, thus giving the feeling of an encapsulated tree or that the tree was only the idea of itself created.</p>
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<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226973916?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226973916?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-left"/></a></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i>Drawing from my sketchbook, winter-spring 2018</i></span></p>
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<p><i> <a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226974749?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226974749?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-left"/></a></i></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i>Drawing from my sketchbook, winter-spring 2018</i></span></p>
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<p>This description gave way to describing on a more straight forward way what I intended to do:</p>
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<p>“… The stage is mostly in all darkness, there's a diffused spotlight in the middle of the stage. I would like to create the 'tree' as an invisible element, through the use of my body and the relation of it to something that is not there (the tree). There is recorded music and lapses of silence. There is video, either on a TV screen on some other small devise (what are the possibilities of project video on a bigger scale) Approximate duration 10 minutes. This is a work-in-process. The movements are derived from the action of sewing, from the act of sitting under a tree (reference to enlightenment), flight, technology, and a destroyed world. The woman is inspired on Lilith, the biblical character, and first partner of Adam before Eva. She was made of clay, just like him and refused to obey his orders, thus she flew from paradise. She did actually fly. Rather than transformation is more a conversation with the tree, a precious living creature and her longing for flight.”</p>
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<p>The idea of making the tree an invisible element creates a ghost-like figure that stresses the disappearing world. The setting expands into including more screens, creating a sense of watching and being watched, of projected realities long gone. Being a work-in-progress, the content of the videos – three screens – were the first draft. I used TV static noise and color bars, pieces of past performances and trees.</p>
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<p><i><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226975438?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226975438?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-left"/></a></i></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i>Drawing from my sketchbook, winter-spring 2018</i></span></p>
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<p><em>Lilith Under the Last Tree,</em> a multi-media performance required actions, sounds and videos. I wanted to challenge myself to use the vocabulary I had developed as a performance art artist and use it to create a work for the stage, a particularly challenging thing to, since it’s up to each artist to create their own vocabulary. Most of my past work hadn’t been for the stage, it was for public spaces- plazas and streets – and galleries.</p>
<p>My work fed from audience proximity and its participation, my strength (and favorites) is in durational works, meaning lasting from 1 to 24 hours. Also, my performances were about <em>doing</em> something with the intention of evoking a reaction or action from those around me, to tell a story in a non-linear, probably through repetition or exhaustion of an action or sometimes I just wanted to do something on the street. For <em>Lilith Under the Last Tree,</em> the intention was to evoke loss and sensuality, a possible curiosity for this woman called Lilith.</p>
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<p>I searched for the one action that would give a general structure to the whole work but I wanted it to be a “real” action, meaning something done in real time but I only had 18 minutes. Some actions I considered doing: sewing wings (many variations), pulling a rope, making knots, making clay sculptures, eating clay sculptures among others. I also wondered how actions could become part of the videos so I included some of my past performances as well as re-creations of two iconic performances one from Marina Abramovic and the other by Ana Mendieta. Sound was an element that, from early drafts I wanted to explore thus sound became the main “action.” Rehearsals were usually about exploring sound.</p>
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<p><i><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226976430?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226976430?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-full"/></a><span style="font-size: 8pt;">Drawing from my sketchbook, winter-spring 2018</span></i></p>
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<p>I wrote a short piece description in Elevator Pitch style, for the promotional material of 140 characters or less:</p>
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<p>“Version 1</p>
<p>A woman sits under a tree, the last tree. She engages in rituals of gesture and sound, everybody is gone. A TV accompanies her, both engage in a narrative of repetition.</p>
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<p>Version 2</p>
<p>A woman sits under a tree. She engages in rituals of gesture and sound as a TV accompanies her, both create a narrative of repetition.”</p>
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<p>From this condensed version a few things stand out to me – “rituals of gesture” and “narrative of repetition.” Action gets replaced with gesture. I don’t think it was a ritual. I wondered how to create repetition creating a sense of confinement of space and time – a kind of glitch in a system.</p>
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<p>[Note: around April the artists presenting at SOAK, all LEIMAY fellows had a sharing of the work. I figured most of my performance during this sharing such as the costume, the ipad on my chest, cables on the floor and a projector projecting a blue light on the wall.]</p>
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<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226977098?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226977098?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-left"/></a></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">Image from April Fellow sharing photo by Eunjin Choi</span></p>
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<p>This was the program version:</p>
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<p>“A woman sits under a tree, the last tree. She engages in rituals of gesture and sound. Everybody is gone. A TV accompanies her and together they create a narrative of repetition. Lilith is, to many, the first woman created on earth. Fast-forward time: now she sits with the only remaining living entity – a tree. This one-woman work-in-progress explores the creation of narrative using the repetition of sound, gesture and video. Polina, whose main art form is performance art, explores how to ‘translate’ an action-driven art form into a theatrical staged work. She questions how the basic elements of performance art: time, space, the performer’s presence and her relationship to the audience, can remain the root of the work as they are transformed into the language of theater.”</p>
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<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226977835?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226977835?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-left"/></a></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><strong>Lilith Under the Last Tree</strong> photo by Shige Moriya</i></span></p>
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<p>Let me describe what happened during the performance.</p>
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<p>The setting: Center stage a pile of black and orange cables, to one side a turned-off projector and next to it a laptop on the floor, connected to an off stage flat screen TV.</p>
<p>The entrance: I enter in darkness from one side, carrying a flat screen TV which faces me. The TV is plugged to electricity and to the laptop; the cables are dragged as I walk up the stairs in the middle of the theater, among the audience. My steps are slow and careful, I can’t see but only feel each step and the cables being pulled, as I reach the top of the stairs I go back down being careful not to trip on the cables. I reach the center and step on the pile of cables. Still in darkness I turned the flat screen towards the audience, I’m wearing another small screen on my chest with the image of a tree. The video on the flat screen is a looping a sequence of black and white static noise, a part of a performance I did in 2014 “Soil, tears and brush” where I’m topless and playing with my long hair and the last shot is of tree branches being moved by the wind. I’m making an “SSSSS” sound, then as the performance progresses I make “A” and “O” sounds.</p>
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<p><i><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226978894?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226978894?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-left"/></a></i></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><strong>Lilith Under the Last Tree</strong> photo by Shige Moriya</i></span></p>
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<p>With a spot light on me, I raise my right arm high up and point towards the sky, referencing a connection to a ‘higher being’ as well as flight.</p>
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<p><i><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226980056?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226980056?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-full"/></a><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><strong>Lilith Under the Last Tree</strong> photo by Shige Moriya</span></i></p>
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<p>Then I walk towards the projector and turn it on, no image is projected but only the projector’s blue light, color bars and hands moving slowly. I stand in front of the projector’s light, which in turn it creates a shadow of me on the wall. I repeat the same pose of raising my arm, this time I lick my arm and laugh. The laugh wasn’t plan, and it actually never came up in any of the rehearsals. I had explored many kinds of ‘Liliths” this time I was bringing a sexual and possibly a bit demonic Lilith.</p>
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<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226980791?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226980791?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-left"/></a></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><strong>Lilith Under the Last Tree</strong> photo by Shige Moriya</i></span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226982053?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226982053?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-left"/></a></i></span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><strong>Lilith Under the Last Tree</strong> photo by Shige Moriya</i></span></p>
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<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226983008?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226983008?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-left"/></a></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><i><strong>Lilith Under the Last Tree</strong> photo by Shige Moriya</i></span></p>
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<p>Then I walked up to the wall and slide down, returned to the flat screen TV and lifted it high up, lied down with the TV on top of me and screamed for a long time. Then I cradled it from behind and ending the performance by unplugging the television.</p>
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<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226984221?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226984221?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-left"/></a></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><strong><em>Lilith Under the Last tree</em></strong> photo by Shige Moriya</span></p>
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<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226985158?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226985158?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-left"/></a></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><strong><em>Lilith Under the Last Tree</em></strong> photo by Shige Moriya</span></p>
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<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226986025?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226986025?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-left"/></a></p>TSW: Tim & Nicotag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-10-17:5831649:BlogPost:876032018-10-17T16:35:29.000ZLou Mandolinihttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/LindseyMandolini
<p><span style="font-size: 18pt;">Time in the (LEIMAY) Studio with</span></p>
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<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: 24pt;">Timothy Scott & Nicolas Noreña…</span></p>
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<p style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971193?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971193?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="700"></img></a></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 18pt;">Time in the (LEIMAY) Studio with</span></p>
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<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: 24pt;">Timothy Scott & Nicolas Noreña</span></p>
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<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">LEIMAY Studio Manager <a href="http://conectom.leimay.org/profile/LindseyMandolini" target="_self">Lou Mandolini</a> in conversation with LEIMAY Fellows Timothy Scott and Nicolas Noreña. Tim and Nico are directors, actors, writers, teachers, and all around great people.</span></p>
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<li class="p1"><strong>LOU- Fall 2018 marks the beginning of your fourth LEIMAY Fellowship, Congratulations! What are you working on this year in the LEIMAY Studio?</strong></li>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">TIM-</span> Well, this is probably the most focused we've been out of all the years so far. We're working on three different projects simultaneously. The first of which is called <em>The Third Man</em> and we're presenting it at the Exponential Festival in January most likely at Vital Joint. </span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">NICO-</span> It's a homoerotic film noir for two audience members. There are only two performers and one projectionist. I remain constant as a performer and the other performer will change each night. Each of the other cast members, three in total, all have very different physicalities and backgrounds. So the idea is to have the character embodied by different people and kind of let the show go in three different directions. Tim will be our projectionist, running projections live. </span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971701?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="600" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971701?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="600" class="align-center"/></a></span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">T- The next thing we're working on is a piece called <em>1001 Sur</em> and there is a possibility in the works that we might be performing it in June. </span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">N- It's a take on the <em>Arabian Nights</em> set in roadside bordello on the frontier between two South American countries. It explores wishes, desires, and imagination, especially a transcultural imagination. It's an inquiry into the exotic. What is the exotic? What are the politics of transcultural imagination? And celebrating that. There will be a group of New York performers and South American performers. It's a large cast of 13 to 14 performers and we're developing the characters together through improvisation. The original idea was to have everyone know every part and at the beginning of the show choose characters out of a hat and go at it. </span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">T- I think it's nice because then everyone's imagination is so activated throughout the whole process and the performance process as well. Hopefully, that will develop a culture that can imagine together and see how that starts to play as a larger framework for what we're talking about. </span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">N- Project three is <em>The Observatory</em> and that one is in it's very, very early stages. The idea of the show is that it is seen from above. The audience is standing on a circular platform and watches the performance looking down over a railing, more or less. The theme of this show is our relationship to outer space, our relationship to the beyond, the reaches of our knowledge and how that is articulated and re-articulated throughout history is often reflective of the state of humanity. There are an endless amount of scientific texts...</span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">T- And every culture has their own philosophy or something to say. Usually, the way we work is, in part, research and writing and in part the staging of it. Right now we are just improvising with the circle idea and the audience's perspective. </span></p>
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<p class="p1" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971883?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="600" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971883?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="600" class="align-center"/></a></span></p>
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<li class="p1"><strong>You co-direct experimental theater company The Millions Underscores — what was the origin/inspiration of this title?</strong></li>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">N- The title is a complete mystery to me that I'm still kind of waiting to understand someday. It feels very right, and it's felt very right from the beginning but everytime someone asks I just have no clue. The second show we worked on as The Million Underscores, <em>(8) Memories of this Atlantis or No Place</em>, the writing process consisted of me drafting text with a bunch of underscores kind of like Mad Libs and then giving the text to Tim and our collaborator Erin. They would fill in the blanks, erase parts, and give it back to me - that's how we developed the script.</span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">T- I always thought it came from Sappho because the texts that we have or have recovered are so destroyed. </span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">N- There are so many versions of answers. An underscore is essentially underlining the empty. For me, when we started the company and throughout, the space in between has been a very important idea. The space in between the text and the visuals, the space in between the actor and the character, the space in between all the different theatrical languages...underling that space instead of letting it collapse. </span></p>
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<p class="p1"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971974?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="700" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971974?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="700" class="align-center"/></a></p>
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<li class="p1"><strong>Any tips for being a co-directors or co-collaborators? I feel like this partnership has been very successful.</strong></li>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">T- We've been working together for 4 or 5 years. <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted onSeek">I</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">think</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">what</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">helped</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">us</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">the</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">most</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">is</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">we</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">realized</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">that</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">the</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">way</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">that</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">we</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">work</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">together</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">could</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">change with every project. We've gotten more comfortable saying what we want to do and what we don't want to do. Instead of feeling like we had to contribute the same amount to each project-- It's not half and half -- which is what I had always assumed a partnership had to be. </span></span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted" style="font-size: 8pt;">N- It's also an acknowledgment that people change and times change. Different projects require different means of different means of production. For every project, we divide things up but we also work together physically in the space a lot. We have an understanding of each other nonverbally. We admire each other and know we have very different ways of thinking.</span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted" style="font-size: 8pt;">T- Learning to appreciate the other's sensibilities even if it doesn't agree with you. </span></p>
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<li class="p1"><strong>In years past you have had a collaborative Fellowship, sharing the studio with female artists Hannah Gross (2015-2016), Michelle Uranowitz (2016-2017), and Sophia Treanor (2017-2018) -- How does this year differ for you now that it's just the two of you? How has having a female voice influenced or driven your work? </strong></li>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">T- They're still all sort of here, just satellite. We were always the organizational force behind it. We see the space (our Fellowship) as the space for The Million Underscores, rather than a training space or a collaborative space for us. But, we clearly missed the girls because we are always inviting them back.</span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">N- Oh, absolutely. They're very, very, very dear to our hearts and to our development as artists. Their energy, what they have to say, what they bring into the room is huge. They each created such a different and beautiful environment for us to work in. </span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">T- In terms of energy, it does ground us. It allows for some creativity to pull through and develop.</span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">N- Three creates a field or a plane instead of just a line between two points. Sometimes with two, it can get combative when ideas are shared. Three creates more space... it feels more expansive. </span></p>
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<li class="p1"><strong>What’s the first thing you do when you begin your rehearsals at CAVE? How has having weekly time carved out for your creative practice change the way work? </strong></li>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">N- Well the first thing we do is clean the floor. We use the dust mop and it's a very nice ritual.</span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">T- Then we lay down and begin rolling around or crawling. Talking about what we want to do that day more than there's a plan. Having space has allowed us to be able to work. Before this, we would just talk about ideas. </span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">N- <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">You</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">know,</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">it's</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">like</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">being</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">a</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">writer </span><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">with</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">no</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">pens</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">or</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">being</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">a</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">painter</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">with</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">no</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">paints.</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">It's</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">just</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">not</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">viable.</span><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted"> </span><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">I</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">was</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">reading</span><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted"> <em>A</em></span><em><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted"> </span><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">Moveable</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">Feast</span></em> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">and</span><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted"> H</span><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">emingway</span><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted"> was </span><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">talking</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">about</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">his</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">little</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">studio</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">and</span><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted"> how </span><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">he</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">would</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">go</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">and</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">write</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">every</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">day</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">and</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">I</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">was</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">like</span><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted"> "O</span><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">h</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">my</span><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted"> G</span><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">od,</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">it's</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">so</span> <span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted">necessary." You can't just develop work without having space to go and work. It's so important and it took me a long time to figure out. But now that we know we really cherish our time. </span></span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">T- It's also been such an amazing thing getting to know LEIMAY. We have a mutual understanding. Now, when we work together or share feedback we can be productive and open. It's a real community.</span> </span></p>
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<p class="p1" style="text-align: center;"><span class="transcript-snippet__content__body__word ng-star-inserted"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226972742?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="600" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226972742?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="600" class="align-center"/></a></span></p>
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<li class="p1"><strong>Tell me about your first experience with LEIMAY, CAVE, or Ximena and Shige?</strong></li>
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<p class="p1">T- <span style="font-size: 8pt;">I was here for <span class="s1">Alex Franz Zehetbauer's residency, which would have been 2012 or 2013, in the Black Studio. I was at CAVE for half the year helping him rehearse and write a new piece. I've really been coming here a few days a week almost every year since I have been out of college, working professionally. I performed in Alex's work at SOAK and...</span></span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1" style="font-size: 8pt;">N- I saw Alex's show and met Ximena. She's Colombian and I'm Colombian so we had a lot to talk about. We were friendly and became close very quickly. At the time, I was rehearsing in a basement space part of where I was living. The basement became cluttered with random furniture and appliances. I filmed a movie there but at a certain point, there was no way to keep pushing down there so we applied for our first Fellowship. </span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1" style="font-size: 8pt;">T- This has always been a space for our community. Between us and friends who came before us who were Fellows or rehearsed in the space...it's our most cherished room in the city. </span></p>
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<li class="p1"><strong>In one sentence, what is at the core of your work? What drives you to create?</strong></li>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">T- The feeling that drives me to create work is playfulness. The instinct to want to play with other people and thus see things reshaping -- language reshaping, relationships reshaping, spaces reshaping -- just from that impulse of wanting to explore something with someone else. </span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">N- It's something similar to what I imagine lead a caveman to make paintings on the walls of caves. I think it's a curiosity about the space in between things. Period. </span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">This conversation was so worth the wait! Thank you for sharing your time with me. We are so grateful to have had both of you in the LEIMAY Community for many years. To learn more about Tim, Nico, and their company The Millions Underscores visit their website <a href="https://www.themillionunderscores.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">HERE</a>.</span></p>PROCESS // Ten years of performance art – a reflection on the creative processtag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-10-13:5831649:BlogPost:870702018-10-13T06:00:00.000ZPolina Porras Sivolobovahttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/PolinaPorrasSivolobova
<p><em>This article is a contribution from 2017-2018 LEIMAY Fellowship Artist Polina Porras Sivolobova. The LEIMAY Fellows are a group of local artists working individually throughout the year at the LEIMAY studio.</em></p>
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<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971120?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971120?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="550"></img></a> Conceptual drawing-map of the performance Viva La Vida, 2014 by Polna Porras Sivolobova</p>
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<p>This year marks ten years since I…</p>
<p><em>This article is a contribution from 2017-2018 LEIMAY Fellowship Artist Polina Porras Sivolobova. The LEIMAY Fellows are a group of local artists working individually throughout the year at the LEIMAY studio.</em></p>
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<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971120?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="550" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971120?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" class="align-center" width="550"/></a> Conceptual drawing-map of the performance Viva La Vida, 2014 by Polna Porras Sivolobova</p>
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<p>This year marks ten years since I graduated from Pratt Institute in New York City. I finished with a Masters in Fine Art and Art and Design Education. My thesis was an exhibition of interdisciplinary works: 200 drawings, performance and video. Since then, I’ve created around 20 original one-time, site specific performances or actions.</p>
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<p>As an artist, it is a pretty big deal when one of the key ingredients/skills of your work – creativity – “disappears.” Imagine owning a restaurant and having just a few cucumbers and some dry bread to make a complete meal. So what do you do? Although the answer for a restaurateur is pretty much straightforward (if you want to stay in business) – you go shopping- but for the artist the answer is a bit more complex. The answer is <em>to Continue.</em> The challenge is <em>the how</em> to continue making art, it’s one thing when you float in clouds of creativity but it’s quite another thing when to make a creation of the size of a pea hurts like having a baby. But I will leave my reflections on <em>the how to continue</em> for another time. For now we will stick to how it was for me in the past, this is a reflection, a short journey into my creative process into how I’ve made art in the past ten years.</p>
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<p><span>Most of my work in the past years has been performance art, public interventions and actions. I used to feel a strong desire to perform, do actions in front of people; it was a way to discover things about the world and myself. These performances were a way to dialogue with other humans; they were artistic social experiments.</span></p>
<p><span>How did these actions came to be, where did the ideas come from? An idea would come at a random moment, when walking or eating, back then it wasn’t a struggle, it would appear in my mind softly and naturally yet with clarity. It would touch something inside of me, a physical sensation accompanied with a clear image, almost like a finished painting. By the time these images would appear I would have been playing with some ideas in my head so when something appeared in the real world it would add itself to the image in my head. Then I would grab onto this initial sensation or image and then start expanding it, first in my head and then through drawing. One image would give way to specific moments of the performance, which in turn they would be threaded into each other creating a story, rather than a narrative story its cohesion would come through a sense of visual theatricality. A clear example of this process was the performance <em>Viva la Vida.</em> It started from a personal desire to throw a watermelon into the wall of a church (don’t ask me where this idea came from), I imagined doing this at night, when no one would be watching, it wasn’t meant to be for an audience. This one-action idea, in the course of 3 months became a six-scene performance with rehearsals, live music, the participation of 27 school children (including teachers, parents and the principal), with the support of the local museum of contemporary art, the smashing of 30 watermelons, in broad day light, the priest’s approval and more than 300 audience members.</span></p>
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<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971695?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="450" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971695?profile=RESIZE_480x480" class="align-center" width="450"/></a> Polina Porras Sivolobova <em>Viva la Vida</em>, 2014, Oaxaca, Mexico photo by Mariana Gonzalez</p>
<p><span><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226972492?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="450" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226972492?profile=RESIZE_480x480" class="align-center" width="450"/></a></span> Polina Porras Sivolobova<em>, Viva la Vida</em>, 2014, Oaxaca, Mexico photo by Pau Line</p>
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<p><span>In my work, a point of departure has been <em>the self</em> - myself, encompassing the physicality of the body and the dimensions of the psyche. In some cases, the body would serve for autobiographical explorations (a characteristic of many performance art works which can fall into a kind of narcissism) and in other cases, departures of the self and into the creation of new-personas.</span></p>
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<p><span>Audience and site specificity have been key elements in the creation of my work by informing the nature of the participation. A gallery in New York City would offer a different range of possibilities than a street intersection in Oaxaca. This range of possibilities would be interlaced into the piece’s theme creating a set of possible interactions, images, emotions and reactions <em>and</em> new possible connections and meanings. Back then; all these elements dropped in front of my mind-eyes with vivid clarity, just like a Tetris game or like Neo decoding The Matrix.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>Early on I became interested in archetypes, psychology and symbols. First, these served as a way of understanding my own life, and then when I got tired of thinking about myself, these female-archetypes became like new friends or possible new-selves (it’s all about the self anyway). Many of these women were from literature – like Shakespeare’s’ <em>Ophelia</em> or <em>Remedios La Bella</em> of “One hundred Years of Solitude.” These women struggled with depression, attempted suicide, suffered violence, were lonely and in pain but they were also resilient, they knew that they would overcome their difficulties. Most of them didn’t speak, they were not able to utter sound, their battles were inside them. Speaking of speech, in some of my performances I explored the inability of sight – either by blindfold, restraining to open my eyes or pouring lime’s juice directly into my eyes.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226973212?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="300" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226973212?profile=RESIZE_320x320" class="align-center" width="300"/></a></span>Polina Porras Sivolobova,</p>
<p><em>What Left and Yet Remains</em>, 2008, New York, photo by Karla Landgrave</p>
<p></p>
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226974556?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="450" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226974556?profile=RESIZE_480x480" class="align-center" width="450"/></a>Polina Porras Sivolobova,</p>
<p><em>Translation of Space</em>, 2015, Former convent of Desierto de los Leones, Mexico City,</p>
<p>Photo by Esmeralda Perez</p>
<p></p>
<p><span>The theme of suffering has been clearly part of my repertoire. My thesis work (2007) was the perfect epitome of suffering; <em>Las Tristes, Muertas Y Dormidas</em>, which translates as The Sad Women, the Dead Women, and the Women who are Asleep. Some years later, in 2013 and as part of another performance, I re-read parts of the text from <em>Las Tristes</em>, I was shaken by its violence and hopelessness. The text was a conversation between many women or possibly one woman talking to herself, as they(she) lay in the dessert -</span></p>
<p><span>“ How have you survived such a drought? All by yourself?</span></p>
<p><span>No, not by myself, I told you there are hundreds of us. We have been knitting our stories into endless shrouds. But nothing happens. How many more? 100? 200? 300? 1000?</span></p>
<p><span>I came in March, they said there were ten more from April to September, they’re lying, it’s forty-five more.</span></p>
<p><span>Right next to that mesquite, that is where it happened, that’s where they killed her.</span></p>
<p><span>Eyes wide open; my voice was silenced by my own heart.</span></p>
<p><span>Tied with her own shoelaces, raped, mutilated breasts, broken neck.</span></p>
<p><span>Our bodies are to blame, they say.</span></p>
<p><span>Construction will start soon, an international treaty, a better life? Huge parking lots, mowed green lawns, imported palm trees, rectangular buildings with cafeterias and recreational areas, activities for workers, work incentives – on oasis. Our crossed-shaped shadows will be covered by a faulting memory and injustice…”</span></p>
<p><span>The work made a direct reference to the murders of women in Cd Juarez, Mexico and indirectly to the issue of “…women’s (mis)education, part of an intricate cultural system of values and prejudices, which usually play in favor of men. Writer Ana Castillo writes, “We are afraid to see how we have taken the values of our oppressor into our hearts and turned them against ourselves and one another.””</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226975345?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="300" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226975345?profile=RESIZE_320x320" class="align-center" width="300"/></a></span></p>
<p>Polina Porras Sivolobova,</p>
<p><em>Las Tristes, Muertas y Dormidas,</em> 2007, Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, NY</p>
<p>Photo by Karla Landgrave</p>
<p></p>
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226976139?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="450" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226976139?profile=RESIZE_480x480" class="align-center" width="450"/></a></p>
<p>Polina Porras Sivolobova, </p>
<p><em>One and Not the Same Sking,</em> 2013, Glass House, Brooklyn, NY, Photo by Eyal Perry</p>
<p>(Reading of text from <em>Las Tristes, Muertas y Dormidas</em>)</p>
<p></p>
<p><span>Exposing suffering and violence as I did it in my past work, doesn’t interest me much now. We live in a world so full of it so I hope to join in the conversation with new more insightful perspectives. In regards to self-referential work, it is an important part of an artist career as a way to grow by testing and practicing vulnerability but the artist cannot remain in it, it has to transcend the self.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>Then in 2012, I did a performance for the stage, during EMERGENYC, a program organized by the Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics, titled “Self-Anatomy 101.” This work marked a departure from my previous work, although it was still about very much about myself it was done in a different <em>tone</em> and rather than being about pain it was about cultural identity. It was a short piece for the stage, I used an original text and I even used sarcasm and humor to explore the pros and cons of being Mexican-Russian-American.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226976259?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="300" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226976259?profile=RESIZE_320x320" class="align-center" width="300"/></a></span>Polina Porras Sivolobova, </p>
<p><em>Self Anatomy 101,</em> 2012, La MaMa Theater, NY,</p>
<p>Photo by the Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics</p>
<p></p>
<p><span>After that performance I did a series of works delving deeper into my Mexican roots; ritual and Catholic iconography became key elements. With this departure, especially the use of religion (since I didn’t grew up religious) I had turned my back to myself as a subject (so I thought) and I was happy.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>Two works, both done in 2014 brought my explorations of ritual, Mexican iconography and Catholicism into a high. <em>Viva la Vida</em> and <em>Santa Agua</em> were spectacular and very Mexican; they had to be done in Mexico and for Mexicans. If done somewhere else they would have been confusing and/or improper, or just un-doable. In both performances I created a rich web of historical, socio-cultural and personal syncretisms; a layering, over layering of related and unrelated stories, rituals, and symbols, so overwhelming that I’m still trying to understand how it all happened. But the truth is that they did happen - I smashed 30 watermelons in front of a church and was covered with honey and glitter by children as I lay on the floor and I paraded around a plaza, hanging from the top of a crane dressed as the Virgin of Guadalupe.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226976887?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="450" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226976887?profile=RESIZE_480x480" class="align-center" width="450"/></a></span> Polina Porras Sivolobova<em>, Viva la Vida</em>, 2014, Oaxaca, Mexico photo by Pau Line</p>
<p></p>
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226977811?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="300" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226977811?profile=RESIZE_320x320" class="align-center" width="300"/></a>Polina Porras Sivolobova</p>
<p>Santa Agua, 2014, HORASperdidas International Performance Festival, Monterrey, Mexico</p>
<p>Photo by Mayleth Guerrero</p>
<p></p>
<p><span>Since then, I have done many other works but nothing compared to <em>Viva la Vida</em> and <em>Santa Agua,</em> those two were surreal not only in their themes but also in the amount of work involved. But I continued to explore themes of female iconography, play, storytelling, ritual and the personal.</span></p>
<p><span>But as I started saying <em>No</em> to collaborations, projects, ideas, and people I ended up saying <em>No</em> to my work (and I had the desire to burn it all), I also started disliking performance art. And with all this came self-doubt and fear.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>This year, I created another new work for LEIMAY’s SOAK. <em>Lilith Under the Last Tree</em>, the first woman on earth cradling the last tree on earth, which is, encapsulated inside a TV screen. With it I hoped to create another departure for my work, making it more “sustainable,” more repeatable, more expandable. I don’t think I accomplished my initial intentions but instead I discovered many other things but more on <em>Lilith</em> in my next essay.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>The ephemeral nature of performance art makes the artist who makes it ephemeral too. The art form has a sense of weightlessness; a ghostly appearance of once it’s done is gone forever. My performances “live” in the dozens of hard drives that store their drawings, writings, pictures and videos and hopefully in the memories of many people. I don’t know what I am going to do now but I know that as the characters of my performances, I will find again my vision and I will speak and fight when the right time comes.</span></p>TSW: Polinatag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-09-18:5831649:BlogPost:869382018-09-18T02:00:00.000ZLou Mandolinihttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/LindseyMandolini
<p><span style="font-size: 18pt;">Time in the (LEIMAY) Studio with </span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: 32px;">Polina Porras Sivolobova</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971115?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971115?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="700"></img></a></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 14pt;">LEIMAY Studio Manager <a href="http://conectom.leimay.org/profile/LindseyMandolini" target="_self">Lou Mandolini</a> in conversation with LEIMAY…</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 18pt;">Time in the (LEIMAY) Studio with </span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: 32px;">Polina Porras Sivolobova</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971115?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="700" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971115?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="700" class="align-full"/></a></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 14pt;">LEIMAY Studio Manager <a href="http://conectom.leimay.org/profile/LindseyMandolini" target="_self">Lou Mandolini</a> in conversation with LEIMAY Fellow Polina Porras Sivolobova. Polina is a visual and performance artist, and all around great human.</span></p>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>LOU- What is the first thing you do when you begin your rehearsal at CAVE?</strong></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">POLINA - The first thing I do is to review my research notes on the current work, after that, I usually expand on the research by reading and taking notes. Then I like to shake things off by drawing and body conditioning. My physical conditioning is a mix of LEIMAY LUDUS exercises and yoga. Lastly, I work on a specific piece, this year it has been "The Flowery Path" - a work about Day of the Dead and "Lilith under the last tree" a multimedia performance for SOAK.</span></p>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>How have weekly rehearsals impacted the way you work?</strong></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">This year has been especially challenging to create art because I’ve been questioning the nature of my work as well as my methodology. The weekly rehearsals have created a structure, a framework or anchor that have helped me to stay grounded during a time of career doubt.</span></p>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li><strong><span class="s1">In one sentence, what is at the core of your work? What drives you to create?</span></strong></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">The core of my work is the creation of visually intriguing work which speaks of transformation and has poetic and surreal undertones. My drive is to be able to bring forth an image/idea which I see with my mind's eye and produce it in the outer world creating new meanings. </span></p>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li><b><span>Discuss your use of the body in your practice…</span></b></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">Most of my work is performance art, often site-specific and participatory. In such instances the use of my body requires to be alert all the time, the body needs to be able to follow the structure of the work yet allowing enough space for spontaneity. My body acts as a social entity, as is in regards to gender, age, race, and socio-cultural background. The audience also becomes a social entity and the whole work a social study. </span></p>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li><strong><span class="s1"><span>Tell me about your first experience with LEIMAY, CAVE, or Ximena and Shige?</span></span></strong></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p><span class="s1" style="font-size: 8pt;">My first experience with LEIMAY was around 2012 when I attended one of their performances, it was the first time I had seen butoh, I was completely fascinated. <span class="aBn"><span class="aQJ">Three years later,</span></span> I started taking the LUDUS workshops on a regular basis and since then have been part of the “family.” Shige and Ximena are very inspiring, with an amazing work ethic which is rarely seen nowadays. They are great colleagues and mentors always pushing me to do better. </span></p>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li><strong><b>After having time to reflect, how was your experience as a producing artist, working collectively, to create SOAK 2018?</b></strong></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">To co-produce and perform at SOAK is a challenge that makes you grow as an artist. SOAK is the perfect platform to try out new artistic ideas and share them with a supportive audience. This year's SOAK was produced by the fellows thus it offered another level of complexity and a glimpse to what is needed to be an artist in today's world.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971720?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="700" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971720?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="700" class="align-full"/></a></span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">From Polina's work "Lilith under the last tree", Photo by Shige Moriya </span></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>If you ran your own space, what would be your focus and how would connect to the community?</strong></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">If I owned my space the focus would be on interdisciplinary arts. It would be in a rural space and the programs would be related to art, nature, environment, technology and the interactions between them.</span></p>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li><strong><b><span>Can you talk about what it means for you to be creating work in New York City as an international artist during this political climate?</span></b></strong></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">It is a challenging time to be an artist. New York adds yet another challenge which is that of its high living prices making it hard to concentrate solely on artistic endeavors. New York can be a deceiving place to be an artist, on one hand, it provides a lot of opportunities such as grants, open calls, and competitions, these create a kind of professionalization for artists and validity but on the other hand, the work is strongly influenced by the demands of these opportunities making it hard to find your own voice as an artist. Personally, I feel that New York's current situation doesn't allow a variety of voices to be heard.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 14pt;">Spoken like a true artist who has her finger on the pulse! Thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to speak with me Polina. As the 2017-2018 LEIMAY Fellowship begins to wind down, you will continue to be an active member of our community as a LEIMAY Team Member. Learn more about Polina and her multifaceted works through her <a href="https://www.polinaporras.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">website</a> and her <a href="http://conectom.leimay.org/profile/PolinaPorrasSivolobova" target="_self">conectom profile</a>.</span></p>
<p></p>PROCESS // trigonometry of lips: notes on perfectionism, or why face lifts can’t heal climate changetag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-09-08:5831649:BlogPost:866552018-09-08T15:45:07.000ZSophia Treanorhttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/SophiaTreanor
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">grids and lines<a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971011?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-right" height="255" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971011?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="191"></img></a></span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">3D printers</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">more and more symmetry</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">gravity, dissociated</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">lasers, lifts, removal…</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">grids and lines<a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971011?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="750" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/1226971011?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="191" class="align-right" height="255"/></a></span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">3D printers</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">more and more symmetry</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">gravity, dissociated</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">lasers, lifts, removal</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">de-mobilizing</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Earth is oxidizing —water your lawn so we don’t see her.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">dry, cracked skin.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">too much fluid in the ankles of Florida</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Disembody—freeze the face. Move to Mars.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Death is showing up in us.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> If you’re alone and big with yourself, the orcas will take turns holding your fins down. They adapt quickly enough.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> Smooth, not breaking the water.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> Turning away from the taste of intervention.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">scared, valuable: eat the wild.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Does she restore her place in the orca matrilineal if saggy skin no longer breaks water?</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Beadlets, gloss. Like Kiera Knightly.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">There is a woman in the world living with a donor’s face. She blew her own off with a gun of the unfaithful lover.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Another woman.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Not room for two oracles.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">And her face, never perfect, obliterated by the hurricane of the bullet moving upward.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Not perfect, never perfect—</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">so, death</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">did not come perfectly.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">No one can see you now, you become a mime of yourself in disfigurement.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">A cartoon, mimicking emotions.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Sending landmarks so that someone might know who you are, where you are.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">The pliability of the face—gives me everything of you..</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Please come back from behind the numbness.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Voluntary disfigurement.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Laser, lift, remove.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Nerves, cut.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Can you still feel so much with your heart?</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">How come I can’t see it?</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">You know who keeps me from the studio? From my creativity?</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Perfect.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">I can’t find it.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">I can’t find it.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">The numbers, the lines.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Not in matter.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">I find it only in my imagination, in theory.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">A flash of it through effort—and it is gone.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">I want to look for something else.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"></p>Please Consider Your Audience: An Opinion Essay by Mariana Taraganotag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-09-06:5831649:BlogPost:866522018-09-06T01:41:46.000ZMariana Taraganohttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/MarianaTaragano
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/111742304?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/111742304?profile=RESIZE_480x480" style="padding: 2px;" width="400"></img></a></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong><u>Please Consider Your Audience…</u></strong></span></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/111742304?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/111742304?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" style="padding: 2px;" class="align-center"/></a></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong><u>Please Consider Your Audience</u></strong></span></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong><u>An Opinion Essay by Mariana Taragano</u></strong></span></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong><u>In a nutshell:</u></strong></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">I claim that we, artists, have to make a decision about the amount of interaction we are interested in with our audiences. I explain this through my own personal story, back it up with some neuroscience and then explain why I believe this artistic choice is actually a social responsibility.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> </span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong><u>My story:</u></strong></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">I was in my twenties when I first started making dance pieces. At that time my motivation for creating work lay in what was interesting to me as a dancer and artist. Sometimes I wanted to practice a certain skill set or combine different types of movements to create new material that would be surprising. I wanted to create something that perhaps was not seen before, something which creation process I enjoyed or benefited from in some sort of way.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Of course, I preferred if other people liked it too but the audience experience was never really a part of my process. That is, I never really thought of what the observer would get out of the experience of observing my work. I was creating an offering and inviting the audience into my world. I loved it when they enjoyed it but if they did not it was absolutely OK. At least in theory.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">It was in this period of time that I also became a very heavy consumer of arts. I was living in London and seeing a lot of dance, theater, performance arts and many things in between. Some of the work was really experimental, some was commercially produced. A lot of it was presented in tiny stages in the small pub-theaters that are so typical of London’s performing arts scenes. At the beginning I enjoyed almost everything I saw. I found pleasure in the familiar, I loved watching skilled dancers and I also appreciated the exploration of some less-skilled performers. But with time I realized that I am seeing some of the same motifs, moves and themes over and over again. I realized that things I thought were ground breaking and new were variations on subjects that have been around for ages. I started analyzing the performances I saw and came to the conclusion that some of the productions simply <em>worked</em>. I also noticed that it did not seem to matter if I was observing a variation of something I saw before or if it was ground breaking. The form was not what was driving my experience. Neither was the theme of the piece. Some of the most ground-breaking material exploring the most interesting and urgent subjects of the time were just not good. What made a piece work was something else.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">As one becomes more competent in their medium it is normal to start explaining, cognitively, how and why one prefers a specific type of art. But it seemed to me that rationalizing my experience was missing the point. It was actually in the rare occasions in which I saw a piece that moved something in me to the point that I was reduced to my primal self, that is, the basic human being that I am: the one that loves, gets hurt, laughs about non-cynical or crazy-intelligent comments and gets tired or sick, that I truly felt the piece was good. You can say it differently too: I truly appreciated being stopped on my tracks, as I believe Ann Bogart once wrote, by a piece of art. For me it is the cognitive self that was stopped and left me to sense myself in my most bare existence.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Now, I do not mean that I appreciated when my experience was reduced to the point in which I am not challenged to think. I do not mean entertained, necessarily. I mean being put in touch with my humanity in such a way that I have no other choice than to question my thoughts and actions in this world.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">It was with this realization that my artist statement changed dramatically and came to include words that other artists seem to dislike. Words like “connection”, “to” and “people”. In the same sentence.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">When I mention to my colleagues that what drives my work is to communicate with the observer I often get a small eye roll and a bunch of warnings. They warn me that I should not “suck up” to my audience. That it is OK if the audience does not like my work. In other words, they warn me not to become an entertainer.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Now, while I do not actually mind entertainment, this is not my intention when creating work. For me, entertainment will engage the audience is a soft, comfortable way. It will allow ones brain to rest, to have a good time by gentle tapping into basic emotions and reassure the audience of its existence. Art on the other hand will get the audience’s brain to work, it will prompt the audience to ask questions and/or to experience various complex feelings. Sometimes art can be entertaining and sometimes entertainment can be artistic. Both art and entertainment require skill. But while skill alone might be entertaining skill without a clear intention cannot be called art.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">When my colleagues look at me with that worried gaze I find it hard to explain that I do not want to, necessarily, make the audience like my work. I am interested in creating an opportunity for them to have an experience that is meaningful.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Just think of art works like Crime and Punishment, Manchester by the Sea, 1984 (not necessarily the book but the play), The Sea Inside*. I’m sure these are not works of art that have made you feel comfortable. But I am also pretty sure that you did not forget these pieces half a day after seeing them. Whether you liked them or not aesthetically most chances are that they stuck with you for a while.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">I also believe that no matter where you are coming from as an audience you did not feel stupid when you watched or read them. That is because these works are clear in intention and their ways of communication is precise. I know I am giving examples of works that are very linear and literal but there are countless of works which structure is less clear and still make a strong and clear impact on the audience, partly because they keep their audience in mind (works by Akram Khan, Punchdrunk, DV8 and Third Rail Productions are an example of clarity with a less clear linearity).</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">My interest in audiences and how to better communicate with them has led me to investigate, first as a part of an MA in Movement Studies at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, and then independently how an audience’s brain works.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> </span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong><u>Mirror Neurons and the Embodied Stimulation Mechanism</u></strong></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Mirror Neurons were first discovered by a team of neuroscientists working at the University of Parma in 1996. Mirror Neurons are first and foremost motor neurons, which means that they activate when a goal related action is conducted: such as grasping a piece of food. What makes Mirror Neurons stand out from other motor neurons is that they are not only activated when a goal-oriented action is executed by an individual but also when such an action is observed by an agent without the agent moving at all (Ammaniti and Gallese, 2014; Gallese, 2005: 2006: 2009: 2010:2012: 2013; Gallese in Wojciehowski, 2011; Hadjikani, 2007; Keysers, 2011*). For example: my Mirror Neurons activate whilst I come to grasp a cup of coffee. The same neurons will fire if I see another person performing the same action, that is, if another person tries to grasp a cup of coffee.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Further research on Mirror Neurons has established that Mirror Neurons are not solely active during the observation of physical actions but also during the observation of emotions and sensations such as (but not limited to) disgust and touch (Gallese, 2009*). This means that when one solely observes, for example, another being caressed, neurons that would fire in the observer’s brain if s/he was the one being caressed are activated. The activation of Mirror Neurons enables the observer to perceive not just the touch but also the quality of that touch, for example: if a certain form of touch is a slap or a caress.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">In addition, it has been shown that visual observation is not the only way to trigger Mirror Neurons (Gallese, 2009*). These seem to be activated through hearing as well as using fragmented pieces of visual, auditory and olfactory information to create a mental image of what is being observed.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Vittorio Gallese, one of the neuroscientist who worked in the Parma team when Mirror Neurons were discovered, has drawn on the discovery of Mirror Neurons and on theories of ‘simulation’, also known as ‘mind-reading’, to establish his own Embodied Simulation Mechanism hypothesis. Now, this might get a bit dense but hang on – it will all come full circle!</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Theories of traditional simulation claim that humans have the capability not only of understanding what others do, but also why others act in certain ways:</span></p>
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<p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">[H]umans [...] start from the observation of an intentionally opaque behaviour, biological, which has to be interpreted and explained in mental terms. This explanatory process is referred to as “mind reading”, that is, the attribution to others of internal mental states, mapped in the mind of the observer as internal representations in propositional format. These representations supposedly play a casual role in determining the observed behaviour to be understood (Gallese, 2009: 522*).</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">In other words, traditional views of simulation claim that one can recognize another’s intention through reading bodily actions and interpreting these by means of conscious introspection and reflection.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Gallese, whilst not denying this conscious process of intersubjectivity, challenges it by positing that human’s capability to understand others’ intentional, emotional and sensational behaviours, that is, to empathise, are a result of basic neural functional mechanisms related to Mirror Neurons. For Gallese:</span></p>
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<p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">[O]ur capacity to empathize with others is mediated [...] by the activation of the same neural circuits underpinning our own emotional and sensory experiences [...] Following this perspective, empathy is to be conceived as the outcome of our natural tendency to experience our interpersonal relations first and foremost at the implicit level of intercorporeity, that is, the mutual resonance of intentionally meaningful sensory-motor behaviors (Gallese, 2009: 523*).</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Empathy is therefore the result of physically experiencing another’s action, emotion or sensation and its quality. The physical experience is the consequence of the activation of the observer’s same corporeal state, if to a lesser degree. For example, seeing someone experiencing the feeling of disgust activates Mirror Neurons in the insula of the observer. The insula is indeed the section of the brain that would activate if the feeling of disgust was truly felt by the observer.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Gallese claims that it is specifically the fact that the observer and the observed share corporeal circuits that allows this direct form of understanding:</span></p>
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<p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">[i]t is a sort of acquaintance from within, capitalizing upon the fact that the shared neural code mapping both my emotional expression and your emotional expression is coupled with the activation of some of the neural correlates of my phenomenal experience of that particular state (Gallese in Wojciehowski, 2011: 5*).</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">The simulation process is in itself embodied rather than rational as “it uses pre-existing body models in the brain, and therefore involves a pre-rational, non-predicative form of representation” (Gallese, 2010*). That is, Embodied Simulation Mechanism is a non-conscious process through which one ‘knows’ certain truths about the other. Therefore the Embodied Simulation Mechanism can be considered as an intuitive one, as it is a non-conscious mental process.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">To summarize, we humans are literally biologically wired for empathy. We are wired to understand each other. And the process by which we understand each other is a non-conscious one, we do not need to reflect upon a situation in order to empathize.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> </span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong><u>The Brain on Performing Arts:</u></strong></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">All of the processes described above occur in an audience member when they watch performing arts. The actions of the performer will either fire up the audience-member’s Mirror Neuron Mechanism or not. It is due to our Mirror Neurons and our Embodied Stimulation Mechanism that we are able to intuitively feel if a performer is being ‘honest’ in their intentions or if the performer is really in the moment – just the same way that we are able to sense when someone is not being honest in a mundane conversation.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Most importantly though, the mechanism will not fire up unless the artist is addressing something that the audience-member can relate to. The way that mirror neurons work is that they fire when one observes an action or feeling that the brain has previously experienced. If the person has not experienced anything in the work s/he is observing there is no potential for this non-conscious, pure and natural connection to occur.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">When a piece of art does not make use of experiences known to the audiences, most audience members will recoil into their own internal world, not in a form of introspection necessarily but in a form of detachment from what they are observing. They will not engage with the piece.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">While doing some research on this theme on my MA I found that this detachment often happens to audiences in dance pieces, even when the audience member is an experienced dancer. Dancers switch off and often describe their experience as “getting bored”. Non-dancers often say that they feel stupid because they could not understand what was happening on stage.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">The beautiful thing for us, artists, is that there is an attention continuum that we can play with. It is not necessary that every single moment in our pieces are to be relatable, especially if we wish to challenge the audience to experience something new. But if we are presenting work that is abstract and challenging to our audiences we can choose to place certain anchors in the piece so the audience does not drown completely and loses attention to the point that they are simply not interested.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">The artist has a few choices: creating opportunity for connection, creating detachment or playing with this continuum of attention. Of course the artist can choose not to make a decision about the intended experience of the audience and leave the audience’s experience to luck or fate but, if you ask me, this is the selfish and irresponsible choice. </span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">What I claim is that we need to understand how humans brains work if we are in the business of creating experiences for people. Which hopefully we are – otherwise the only reason to present out work in narcissism.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong><u>Artistic Responsibility:</u></strong></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">I personally choose connection as the goal of my work. I choose connection because I believe it is my responsibility as an artist to create opportunities for human connection.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">The Mirror Neuron mechanism might be one of the most important mechanisms for society. Some researchers go as far as to claim that it is this mechanism that has facilitated humans place in the food chain and allowed the human race to develop to the point to which it has. I will not go into too much detail about the importance of empathy and understanding in our world. I think all readers can imagine the consequences of a world without empathy.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">But while the Mirror Neuron System is built in us it needs to be trained and used so it can function well and keep developing: just like all other abilities in our brains and in our bodies. The brain is plastic and it can shift and change depending on the experiences it undergoes. At this moment in time we live in a society in which opportunities for real human connection and interaction are scarce. We barely talk to each other face to face. We communicate through email and text or in the worst cases with emoji’s, a double click on an image or a thumbs up. We share our pains and joins in a virtual world that cannot see our expressions in the words we type and we do not get to see the physical expression of the readers in response to our stories. This is numbing our brain’s capacity for empathy.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">There is an immense opportunity for creating true connections through art and people are thirsty for this type of human connection. This thirst is the reason Marina Avramovic’s The Artist Is Present was such a big success. She simply created an opportunity for real human connection in a time of need.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">There is another reason that I believe it is our responsibility as artists to make work that takes the audience in mind. A financial one. I might not like the fact that we live in a capitalistic world but that will not change the fact that we do. Making work that creates no experiences for our audiences actually drives potential audiences to entertainment rather than art. They can switch on any screen and at the touch of the button get a quick emotional fix for their real connection thirst. They might not get a real connection but at least they will feel something and it will be for far less money and effort than going out to see work that is not relatable. We have to understand the reality that we live in and at least attempt to move something (or stop something) in our audiences internal world. Otherwise it is unfair to expect them to get out of the house, invest in transport, a ticket and a babysitter. It is also unfair to feel disappointed when entertainment is more liked than our art.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;">So please, I encourage you to re-discover your relationship to the audience and make a decision about it. It does not have to be a positive experience but consider making a conscious decision about your relationship with the audience. If you do not - and excuse the comparison but since this is not an academic paper I will express myself in this manner – then you are performing an art of artistic masturbation. You are creating for your own pleasure alone. Which is fine. But if you are calling upon an audience to observe such an act it has to be done in very specific terms with specific observers. Making it public does not make it valuable the world.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong> </strong></span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong><u>*Further Material:</u></strong></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Adentro-Inside-NTSC-REGION-DVD/dp/B000KGAAUE">Amenábar, A (2004) Mar Adentro (film)</a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Birth-Intersubjectivity-Psychodynamics-Neurobiology-Interpersonal/dp/0393707636/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1535646825&sr=8-1&keywords=the+birth+of+intersubjectivity">Ammaniti, M. and Gallese, V. (2014) The birth of intersubjectivity: psychodynamics, neurobiology and the self. London & New York: W. W. Norton & Company.</a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WKw5eXIfNaU">Avramovic, M. (2012) The Artist is Present film</a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="https://macsphere.mcmaster.ca/bitstream/11375/6827/1/fulltext.pdf">Bennet, S. (1988) The Role of the Theatre Audience: A Theory of Production and Reception. Doctor of Philosophy Thesis, McMaster University, Ontario</a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Immersive-Theatre-Audience-Experience-Punchdrunk/dp/331962038X">Biggin, R. (2017) Immersive Theatre and Audience Experience: A</a></span><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=Pp6CAgAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=anne+bogart&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwinl_GlgZrdAhUBVd8KHXWJCmAQ6AEINTAC#v=onepage&q=anne%20bogart&f=false">rt and theatre. London: Routledge.</a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Crime-Punishment-Fyodor-Dostoyevsky/dp/0486415872">Dostoyevsky, F (1866) Crime and Punishment</a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40nZEVzCYi8">Gallese, V. (2006) ‘Art and the New Biology of the Mind forum’, Lecture, the Italian Academy.</a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="http://www.unipr.it/arpa/mirror/pubs/pdffiles/Gallese/Gallese%202005.pdf">Gallese, V. (2005) Embodied simulation: from neurons to phenomenal experience, Phenomenology and Cognitive Sciences, 4, pp. 23-48, Springer.</a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2gqfIdNw-k">Gallese, V. (2013) ‘Finding the body in the brain’, Lecture, 14th Joseph Sandler Psychoanalytical Research Conference at the Frankfurt Sigmund Freud Institution</a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PlV7F3MHuEk">Gallese, V. (2010) ‘From mirror neurons to embodied simulation: a new perspective on intersubjectivity’, Lecture, The Arnold Pfeffer Center for Neuropsychoanalysis at the New York Psychoanalytic Institute</a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="http://www.unipr.it/arpa/mirror/pubs/pdffiles/Gallese/2009/Gallese_PD2009a.pdf">Gallese, V. (2009) Mirror neurons, embodied simulation and the neural basis of social identification, Psychoanalytical Dialogues, 19, pp. 519-536, Taylor & Francis Group.</a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YorIXdQiNVU">Gallese, V. (2012) ‘The body in aesthetic experience: a neuroscientific perspective’, Lecture, Center for Science, Technology, Medicine & Society at the University of California, Berkeley</a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="http://www.nmr.mgh.harvard.edu/nouchinelab/pdfs/Hadjikhani_MNS&autism_chapter.pdf">Hadjikhani, N. (2007) ‘Mirror neuron system and autism’ in P. C. Carlisle (ed.) Progress in autistic research. Nova Science Publishers Inc. pp. 151-166.</a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="http://www.openculture.com/2017/10/your-brain-on-art-the-emerging-science-of-neuroaesthetics-probes-what-art-does-to-our-brains.html">Kaufman, S. L., Player, D., Orenstein, J., Lam M., Hart, E. and Tan, S. (2017) This is Your Brain on Art, The Washington Post (Sept. 18<sup>th</sup> 2017)</a> </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Empathic-Brain-Christian-Keysers-2011-11-01/dp/B01MTLJCZ5/ref=sr_1_fkmr2_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1535647043&sr=1-2-fkmr2&keywords=Keysers%2C+C.+%282011%29+The+empathic+brain%3A+how+the+discovery+of+mirror+neurons+changes+our+understanding+of+human+nature.">Keysers, C. (2011) The empathic brain: how the discovery of mirror neurons changes our understanding of human nature.</a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Manchester-Sea-Casey-Affleck/dp/B01M3X9T06">Lonergan, K (2016) Manchester by the Sea</a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1984_(play)">Orwell, G, Icke, R and Macmillan, D (2013) 1984 (play)</a></span></p>
<p><a href="http://escholarship.org/uc/item/56f8v9bv"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Wojciehowski, H. C. (2011). In</span>terview with Vittorio Gallese. California Italian Studies</a></p>TSW: Judithtag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-08-22:5831649:BlogPost:864832018-08-22T14:29:24.000ZLou Mandolinihttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/LindseyMandolini
<p><span style="font-size: 18pt;">Time in the (LEIMAY) Studio with </span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: 24pt;">Judith Barnes</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342005?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342005?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="700"></img></a></span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">LEIMAY Studio Manager…</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 18pt;">Time in the (LEIMAY) Studio with </span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: 24pt;">Judith Barnes</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342005?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="700" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342005?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="700" class="align-center"/></a></span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">LEIMAY Studio Manager <a href="http://conectom.leimay.org/profile/LindseyMandolini" target="_self">Lou Mandolini</a> in conversation with LEIMAY Fellow Judith Barnes. Judith is a director, opera singer, sculptor, and all around great human.</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong>LOU - As a returning Fellow, what are you working on this year in the LEIMAY Studio?</strong></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">JUDITH- This year I continue to work on my singing, exploring repertoire, exploring personae, and exploring stories. Claiming space physically and mentally as a solo performer while continuing to pursue my sometimes elusive vision as a singer/director. I continue to work on incorporating my sculpture and my visual and spatial sense into creating operatic performance. In that vein, I’m developing ideas for a production of Bartók’s great opera <i>A Kékszakallu Herceg Vára</i>, Bluebeard’s Castle, following the imaginative thread of the articles I wrote last year for conectom. I’ve also been dreaming of the Greek myths that were such a powerful influence on my childhood. For conectom, I recently wrote a draft for a libretto based on the myth of Persephone, and it has been an interesting exercise in structure and storytelling, which I would like to pursue further.</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong>How do weekly rehearsals at CAVE bolster your creative process?</strong></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">Getting to CAVE on a weekly basis has been particularly challenging this year. I am recovering from surgery and dealing with physical pain. But the dedicated hours remind me constantly that I have a creative life, an imperative, despite whatever obstacles I might be facing personally.</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong>Last year when we sat down together you defined your desire to create as <em>"a spiritual imperative, a search, a restlessness, an impossible possibility, an antidote to death"</em>. What are your thoughts on that definition a year later? </strong></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">I still feel that way. Perhaps even more so. Doing the work is difficult for me these days, mentally and physically, but the promise of creation illuminates my darkest moments.</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong>As an accomplished opera singer and pioneer of the alternative opera movement in NYC, what advice would you give to someone who is new to vocal training? Any advice for someone who is attending an opera for the first time? </strong></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">Singing should be a physical pleasure. If it isn’t, search for the pleasure in every sound you emit. You only have one body so be kind to your vocal cords. If you are someone going to the opera for the first time, surrender to the sensuality of the experience. Remember that production styles come and go but the core of the art form is the music and the way it marries to the story - even if the story is very abstract. Allow yourself to feel the music physically and intuitively. Leave the critical mind behind. It will be waiting for you later!</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong>After having time to reflect, how was your experience as a producing artist, working collectively, to create SOAK 2018? </strong></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">I am always glad to have a deadline and pressure to create. I think it pushed me to make work even when I didn’t feel ready and suddenly I found that I <em>was</em> ready when it came time to get out on stage! Working together with everyone to produce the series was interesting, challenging, and gratifying. I feel proud of what we all did together.</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong>If you ran your own space, what would be your focus and how would you connect to the community?</strong></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">I have been running a space for some time now, a storefront theater, which is also my home. I have not really been able to achieve my dreams for the space. My desire for privacy and solitude is constantly at odds with the intense social life necessary to build a functioning, vibrant gathering place. In my dreams, I would love to have a multifaceted arts center, with ongoing workshops and training, and with a theater especially suited to unamplified music. And I would not live in the performance space!</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">Thank you for sharing your thoughts with me Judith. Your commitment to your craft is inspiring! Read Judith's reflections on Bluebeard's Castle as she continues to develop her vision for a future production. <a href="http://conectom.leimay.org/profiles/blogs/process-some-questions-about-the-seven-doors-of-bluebeard-s" target="_self">Article #1</a> & <a href="http://conectom.leimay.org/profiles/blogs/perceptions-judith-at-the-seventh-door-of-bluebeard-s-castle" target="_self">Article #2</a>. Learn more about Judith and connect with her through here <a href="http://conectom.leimay.org/profile/JudithBarnes" target="_self">connectom</a> profile.</span></p>PROCESS // PERSEPHONE: An Outlinetag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-08-07:5831649:BlogPost:864502018-08-07T23:00:00.000ZJudith Barneshttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/JudithBarnes
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p><b><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342123?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342123?profile=RESIZE_480x480" style="padding: 2px;" width="400"></img></a></b></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">(Image: The Rape of Persephone, Greek fresco from Macedonian tomb circa 400 B.C., Museum of the Royal Tombs of Aigai)</span></em></span></p>
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<p><b>PERSEPHONE</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Draft Outline for an Opera Libretto in Three Acts…</span></p>
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<p><b><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342123?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342123?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-full" style="padding: 2px;"/></a></b></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">(Image: The Rape of Persephone, Greek fresco from Macedonian tomb circa 400 B.C., Museum of the Royal Tombs of Aigai)</span></em></span></p>
<p></p>
<p><b>PERSEPHONE</b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Draft Outline for an Opera Libretto in Three Acts</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">by Judith Barnes</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><i><span style="font-weight: 400;">Dramatis Personae</span></i><span style="font-weight: 400;">:</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">PERSEPHONE, daughter of DEMETER and ZEUS, Goddess of Spring</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">DEMETER, Goddess of the Earth, Harvest, and Fertility, mother of PERSEPHONE, sister of ZEUS and HADES</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">ZEUS, God of the Sky and the Thunder, Ruler of the Gods, father of PERSEPHONE, brother of DEMETER and HADES</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">HADES, God of the Dead, brother of DEMETER and ZEUS, uncle of PERSEPHONE</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">HELIOS, God of the Sun</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">NARCISSUS, a young man who has been turned into a flower</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">THREE NYMPHS, later SIRENS</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">CERBERUS, three-headed dog and Guardian of the Underworld </span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">THE LIVING</span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">THE DEAD</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">ACT 1 SCENE 1</span></p>
<p><b>THE MEADOW, ETERNAL SPRING</b></p>
<p><i><span style="font-weight: 400;">PERSEPHONE, THREE NYMPHS, HELIOS, NARCISSUS</span></i></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<p><img width="300" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342132?profile=RESIZE_320x320" width="300" class="align-right" style="padding: 2px;"/></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">PERSEPHONE and her three friends, the NYMPHS, are playing in the meadow. Tired from their play, they lie down to doze in the caressing warmth of HELIOS, the Sun. But PERSEPHONE feels too hot. HELIOS' caresses annoy her. Seeing a pond in the distance, she wants to go splash herself with water. The NYMPHS try to stop her</span><span style="font-weight: 400;">, </span><span style="font-weight: 400;">saying that her mother, DEMETER, has warned them not to let her out of their sight, but she dismisses their fears and sets off by herself. The NYMPHS shrug, too sleepy and warm in HELIOS's embrace to follow. They fall asleep.</span></p>
<p><b> </b></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Arriving at the pond, PERSEPHONE finds NARCISSUS, a beautiful flower, growing on the bank. Excited by his beauty, PERSEPHONE gazes at his reflection in the water and sees her own. She sees that she too is beautiful, and sees how beautiful they are together. She reaches out to touch the water and the two reflections, his and hers intertwined, reach up to touch her.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">(Image: </span><span style="font-weight: 400;">Arthur Bowen-Davies (1862-1928), The Myth of Persephone)</span></em></span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">ACT 1 SCENE 2</span></p>
<p><b>THE DEAL</b></p>
<p><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">HADES, ZEUS</span></em></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Meanwhile, HADES has noticed lovely PERSEPHONE in the meadow. He comes to his brother ZEUS, complaining about the hard, dark, and gloomy work he does in the Underworld. He says he is lonely, shy, tired of being around the dead all the time, not gifted with women. He asks his worldly, sexually confident brother to help him out. He points out PERSEPHONE gazing into the pond, and says he likes the way she looks, her youth, her warmth, her sunniness. He asks ZEUS to help him get her for his bride. ZEUS reminds HADES that she is their sister DEMETER’s daughter, who surely will not want her to be taken to live in the gloom of the Underworld. HADES reminds ZEUS of the indispensable work he does, clearing the souls of the dead away from the Overworld, guarding them when they try to escape, keeping them far from the living. He says he doesn’t ask for favors very often, despite the fact that he has the worst job of all the gods. ZEUS agrees with all that HADES says. He tells HADES that the best way to get PERSEPHONE is to take her by force, otherwise she would never agree to go. He urges HADES to act quickly while she is unattended.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342177?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342177?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-left" style="padding: 2px;"/></a></span></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">ACT 1 SCENE 3</span></p>
<p><b>THE RAPE OF PERSEPHONE</b></p>
<p><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">PERSEPHONE, NARCISSUS, HADES, THREE NYMPHS</span></em></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">PERSEPHONE’s discovery of NARCISSUS resumes as if in a dream or slow motion, interrupted by a sudden shaking of the earth, which opens up in front of PERSEPHONE. NARCISSUS disappears along with the water of the pond which pours down into the dark chasm. PERSEPHONE reaches for NARCISSUS, and falls. Out of the darkness, HADES rises up and grabs her, forces his lips on hers. She screams. The three NYMPHS, startled from sleep, come running, just in time to see HADES and PERSEPHONE disappear into the chasm.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">(Image: </span><span style="font-weight: 400;">Rembrandt van Rijn, The rape of Proserpina (detail), Staatliche Museen, Berlin)</span></em></span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">ACT 1 SCENE 4</span></p>
<p><b>DEMETER</b></p>
<p><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">DEMETER, NARCISSUS, THREE NYMPHS</span></em></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">DEMETER hears the echo of the screams of her daughter and runs toward the sound, but it is too late. The earth has closed back up, and there is no trace of PERSEPHONE. The pond is dry and NARCISSUS lies broken. DEMETER demands to know what happened, but the NYMPHS have become mute in terror—they can make sounds but no words. DEMETER curses them for allowing PERSEPHONE to come to harm, and they are transformed into the SIRENS: women with the bodies of birds who sing haunting wordless songs that entice men to their doom. They scatter, shrieking, as DEMETER keens in mourning for her lost daughter.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">ACT 2 SCENE 1</span></p>
<p><b>UNDERWORLD / OVERWORLD</b></p>
<p><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">THE DEAD, PERSEPHONE, HADES, CERBERUS, DEMETER</span></em></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">In the darkness, among the souls of THE DEAD, PERSEPHONE trembles. Where am I, she asks. Am I dead? No, says HADES, you are not dead. I have brought you here to be my wife. He presses his body against hers. PERSEPHONE cries out. HADES tries to be gentle, offering her sweets and cold drinks, but she is repulsed by him and his domain. She refuses all food, saying it must be poisoned, dead food. She tries to escape, but HADES overpowers her. He sets CERBERUS, the three-headed dog, to guard PERSEPHONE. She weeps, calling for her mother.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342135?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="250" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342135?profile=RESIZE_320x320" width="250" class="align-right" style="padding: 2px;"/></a></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Simultaneously, and overlapping the scene in the Underworld, DEMETER searches for her daughter in the Overworld. She calls for PERSEPHONE ten times, representing the ten days and nights she searched, bearing torches to illuminate all the dark </span><span style="font-weight: 400;">places, and to shine brightly in case PERSEPHONE might see her.</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">(Image: Demeter of Cnidus, 333 BC)</span></em></span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">ACT 2 SCENE 2</span></p>
<p><b>DEMETER’S CURSE</b></p>
<p><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">DEMETER, HELIOS</span></em></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Finally, DEMETER begs HELIOS, the Sun God, who sees everything, to tell her what happened to her daughter. Breaking his rule of silence, all-seeing HELIOS tells her that HADES rose up from the Underworld and snatched her away to be his bride. DEMETER says she will go to the Underworld and bring her daughter back. HELIOS says there is nothing to be done, because ZEUS agreed to the abduction. DEMETER curses ZEUS, HADES and HELIOS for their conspiracy, and all men for their rape and abuse of women. She vows to make the earth and all life upon it suffer. HELIOS covers his face in shame.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">ACT 3 SCENE 1</span></p>
<p><b>THE BARGAIN</b></p>
<p><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">THE LIVING, ZEUS, DEMETER</span></em></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">DEMETER mourns. She causes the earth to become dark, dull, dry, and cold. The trees and flowers die and the crops fail. Human beings can no longer grow food and famine overtakes the earth; people and animals are dying of thirst and hunger and exposure to the cold winds as they huddle around fires to try to stay warm. ZEUS comes to DEMETER where she sits, on a rock, immoveable, stony faced. All his overtures are met with silence, until he finally agrees to allow PERSEPHONE to return to the Overworld. DEMETER promises to restore fertility to the earth once her daughter is safe in her arms.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">ACT 3 SCENE 2</span></p>
<p><b>THE TRICK</b></p>
<p><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">HADES, PERSEPHONE</span></em></p>
<p><em><span style="font-weight: 400;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342079?profile=original" target="_self"><img src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342079?profile=original" width="236" class="align-right" style="padding: 2px;"/></a></span></em></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">HADES has learned that ZEUS has changed his mind. He goes to PERSEPHONE, who is in a state of confusion and depression. She has been on a hunger strike. She doesn’t know, or want to believe, where she is, hoping that she will wake up one day and it will all have been a dream. She alternately clings to and is disgusted by HADES. He tells her that her luck has changed and he has decided that she is free to go. He gently helps her to tidy herself up, to wash her face, straighten her clothes and hair. He offers her food and drink, and she, in her hopefulness and happiness, allows herself to be tempted by the ruby-like seeds of the pomegranate. She eats six seeds. As soon as she has eaten them, HADES smiles, for he knows that anyone who eats the food of the dead is condemned to stay below.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">(Image: Minoan Fresco from Crete)</span></em></span></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">ACT 3 SCENE 3</span></p>
<p><b>THE RETURN</b></p>
<p><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">PERSEPHONE, THE DEAD, CERBERUS, DEMETER</span></em></p>
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<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Escorted by CERBERUS and the spirits of THE DEAD, PERSEPHONE journeys through the Underworld, across the River Styx, and upward into the light, where she falls into DEMETER’s arms. At their joyful reunion the world springs once again to life</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342180?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="300" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342180?profile=RESIZE_320x320" width="300" class="align-left" style="padding: 2px;"/></a></span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">ACT 3 SCENE 4</span></p>
<p><b>THE CONFESSION</b></p>
<p><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">DEMETER, PERSEPHONE</span></em></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">DEMETER questions PERSEPHONE about her time in the Underworld. When she asks whether PERSEPHONE ate anything while she was there, PERSEPHONE at first denies it, but then admits that she did eat a few little pomegranate seeds. DEMETER falls silent. A chill descends upon the earth and between mother and daughter, and PERSEPHONE realizes what she has done.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">(Image: Demeter and Persephone, Ceramic, Asia Minor, circa 100 B.C.)</span></em></span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">ACT 3 SCENE 5</span></p>
<p><b>THE COMPROMISE</b></p>
<p><em><span style="font-weight: 400;">HADES, DEMETER, PERSEPHONE, ZEUS</span></em></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">HADES arrives to claim PERSEPHONE. He tells DEMETER, that as she well knows, since PERSEPHONE ate the food of the dead, she must return with him to the Underworld. DEMETER calls on ZEUS. She threatens to cause the destruction of the earth and all life upon it with unrelenting, barren winter. HADES, for his part, threatens to close the gates of the Underworld and not allow any more dead to enter. ZEUS is faced with either the utter loss of humankind or a glut of dead souls wandering the earth. He proposes a compromise.</span></p>
<p><img width="250" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342142?profile=RESIZE_320x320" width="250" class="align-right" style="padding: 2px;"/></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">PERSEPHONE will spend one month in the Underworld for each of the six pomegranate seeds that she has eaten. The other six months of the year, she will be free to spend in the Overworld with her mother. DEMETER is compelled to agree, but swears she will not allow anything to grow for those six months each year that her daughter is apart from her.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">PERSEPHONE, coming into a reluctant maturity, realizes that she has lost her one chance to have her former, carefree life restored. Her youthful openness gives way to a grim acceptance. HADES leads PERSEPHONE back to the Underworld to become the Queen of the Dead. A coldness enters her soul, as a cold wind once again overtakes the earth. HELIOS covers his face, and darkness descends. ZEUS returns to Olympus, and DEMETER remains alone on her rock, gazing out over the darkened horizon.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em>(Image: <span style="font-weight: 400;">Persephone, Queen of the Underworld, ancient Greek statue, Tarentum, Italy 480-60 B.C.)</span></em></span></p>
<p></p>
<p><b>EPILOGUE</b></p>
<p><b>THE SIRENS</b></p>
<p><em>THE SIRENS, DEMETER</em></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">DEMETER sends the SIRENS out over the ocean to take revenge on men by luring them to their doom.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342088?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342088?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-left" style="padding: 2px;"/></a></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em>(Image: <span style="font-weight: 400;">Three Sirens, Red Figure Greek vase, 475-450 BC)</span></em></span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">This is a draft for an opera libretto by Judith Barnes, all rights reserved copyright 2018</span></span></p>TSW: Drewtag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-08-01:5831649:BlogPost:844252018-08-01T15:44:45.000ZLou Mandolinihttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/LindseyMandolini
<p><span style="font-size: 18pt;">Time in the (LEIMAY) Studio with </span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: 24pt;">Drew Weinstein</span></p>
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<p style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341930?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341930?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="600"></img></a></p>
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<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">LEIMAY Studio…</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 18pt;">Time in the (LEIMAY) Studio with </span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: 24pt;">Drew Weinstein</span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341930?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="600" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341930?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="600" class="align-center"/></a></p>
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<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">LEIMAY Studio Manager <a href="http://conectom.leimay.org/profile/LindseyMandolini" target="_self">Lou Mandolini</a> in conversation with LEIMAY Fellow Drew Weinstein. Drew is a director, composer, sound designer, and all around great human.</span></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<ul>
<li><strong><span class="s1">LOU- What is the first thing you do when you begin your rehearsal at CAVE?</span></strong></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><span class="s1">DREW- It’s funny because my rehearsals at CAVE have varied so much depending on what I’m working on. </span><span class="s1">For my own practice, I start by sitting in the space. I spend about ten minutes laying down and </span><span class="s1">breathing which for me is a means of leaving whatever else is going on (in my life) at the door. Taking </span><span class="s1">in the space for what it is and trying to enter my hours with an objective mindset instead of with all of </span><span class="s1">the subjectivity I bring to space as a person in the world.</span></span></p>
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<li><strong><span class="s1">How have weekly rehearsals impacted the way you work?</span></strong></li>
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<p><span class="s1" style="font-size: 8pt;">I’m currently looking at a couple of different projects in the space — trying to balance outside work with my own practice. It can be jarring coming out of larger rehearsal process and trying to connect back to my personal practice but it’s been so helpful to know I have my Sundays every week at CAVE.</span></p>
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<p><span class="s1" style="font-size: 8pt;">Especially with my sound work, it has given me time to listen in a more constructive way. </span><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><span class="s1">In comparison to working from home or in a public space, where there is so much external stimuli,</span> <span class="s1">I can focus in on the sound and my listening is much better —<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> more bodily. It’s not just listening with my ears and with my brain, I’m listening with my body which really makes an impact on putting together sound. When putting together audio ideas, "yes" you want to hit intellectual concepts, pull together motifs, etc. BUT you also want to strike people somewhere. I listen and feel what strikes me — I think and hope that will transfer to what I’m creating for others. </span></span></p>
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<li><strong><span class="s1">In one sentence, what is at the core of your work? What drives you to create?</span></strong></li>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><span class="s1">At the end of the day, the act of artistic creation no matter how you do it adds something to humanity’s collective consciousness and I think there is so much value and importance in that.</span> <span class="s1">I want to be able to add to that bubble. Oh gosh, this is not a sentence. Creating art and creating work is really the only way I’ve been able to successfully comprehend myself and the world around me. When something affects me the only real way of dealing with it is through creation. That isn't always making a large scale theatrical work for everyone to see, sometimes it's just writing a song in my room that I will never show anyone. However, hen something has truly struck a chord with me and I believe the ideas are important enough to go outward, that’s when larger work that I’m showing comes into play.</span></span></p>
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<ul>
<li><strong><span class="s1">Tell me about your first experience with LEIMAY, CAVE, or Ximena and Shige?</span></strong></li>
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<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><span class="s1">I had heard a lot about all of the above from Raul Zbengheci (former LEIMAY Producer) and the entire HERE Arts Community. My first experience was for my Administrator/Producer interview. I remember coming to CAVE that first day... it was a beautiful and strange world. </span> <span class="s1">What struck me most after sitting down with Ximena and Shige was their sincerity. There wasn’t any cynicism or pretension, which we have all run into in the arts, it was meaningful and passionate. This situation has not come about with ease but that’s the merit of it. It came about with hard work, with blood, sweat, and tears. I left feeling like I could really spend a year here and learn. </span></span></p>
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<li><strong>What does it mean to you to be a producing artist, working collectively, to create SOAK 2018?</strong></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">It’s super exciting. I think I’m the only Fellow who has had the experience on both sides. As a producing artist, I produced SOAK 2017, and it’s been very cool to see it happen like this. Hats off not only to the LEIMAY Team but to all of the Fellow artists. Seeing messages exchanged and marketing come together in this way, everyone is really “in it to win it”.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> To witness a collective collaboration happen and it’s working! It is the shared mentality at LEIMAY if everyone gives a little no one has to give a lot. An important and refreshing experience in comparison to working with artists who don’t have any comprehension of the role and tasks of a producer. I wish there were more festivals or seasons made this way because I think it would create a lot more cohesion within the community.</span></p>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>If you ran your own space, what would be your focus and how would connect to the community?</strong></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">I have been thinking a lot about this lately as a long-term goal. If I were to ever open up my own space it would be in my hometown, Pittsburgh. I have a lot of respect for the history and the people there. The city itself is dealing with many of the same issues as NYC in terms of gentrification and the displacement of people but on a smaller scale. In New York, young artists who want to create work or art spaces are dealing with a lot of oversaturation. I would create a space in a city that has a need for it. Pittsburgh at the end of the day is a blue-collar city but there is a younger generation of people who are curious about art and need exposure. I want to expand people's understanding of performance and what it can be. </span></p>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 14pt;">Thanks for finding the time to meet with me and have this exchange. After being in an administrative role as a LEIMAY Team Member, you continued on and became a LEIMAY Fellow. It has been amazing to see your work and relationship with our community develop and grow!</span></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>Performance as a Work-In-Progress, of Lifetag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-08-01:5831649:BlogPost:865262018-08-01T04:30:00.000ZEunjin,Choihttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/EunjinChoi
<p><a href="http://conectom.leimay.org/profiles/blogs/performance-as-a-work-in-progress-of-life" target="_self"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342070?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"></img></a></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>The mutual transformation and influence between everyday life and practice of art is a common experience among many artists. The experience is intense for artists with an art practice that necessitates the recording of their process and art form into the cells of their bodies, particularly performance artists and performing artists who have to enact…</span></p>
<p><a href="http://conectom.leimay.org/profiles/blogs/performance-as-a-work-in-progress-of-life" target="_self"><img width="750" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342070?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750" class="align-full"/></a></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>The mutual transformation and influence between everyday life and practice of art is a common experience among many artists. The experience is intense for artists with an art practice that necessitates the recording of their process and art form into the cells of their bodies, particularly performance artists and performing artists who have to enact the work of art. Sometimes it would feel like living the work rather than producing it. </span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span><i>Misunderdance</i>, which was introduced to New York as a work-in-progress version this spring, was first attempted in Wales in 2015. It was derived from the research I was undergoing in other projects in 2013 and while I was focused on exploring various connections between body and language. I was particularly interested in how different cultures have their own language and how similarities exist between different languages. Wales Summer Camp, which was an excellent program, was a great opportunity for me to meet and work with various artists who can speak more than one language. By the end of the program, three videos were created in collaboration with video artist Caroline Vasquez and other talented artists. </span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>Several years after the Wales Summer Camp program, I wanted to make a live performance using the same inspirations and got a chance to present it at SOAK in New York. So I got back to work on this project in the US in the spring of 2017. This time, however, I had gained a new perspective. If my interest in communication between different languages and people were initially from a place of curiosity and research, as I started living in the US with the possibility of staying longterm, they became a subject matter at the center of my everyday life.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>The United States I first encountered was obsessed with ‘diversity.’ By moving to a new environment where many different race and ethnicities gather to live—which was simultaneously exciting and disorienting—my thoughts on how to live our differences began to swell. </span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>In this work, four actors, artists from Russia, Japan, Mexico, and South Korea, attempt to converse with one another in their languages. There are strategies to keep the conversations going however fundamentally the conversations are impossible without repeatedly trusting that the other is not saying anything with an intention to be hurtful.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>I was happy about the immersion into the work especially because my environment has changed which made most of the experiences I had garnered prior to my move obsolete and in many cases, without any way to know the feelings of others, the days of heartaches prolonged in the accumulating misunderstandings—or perhaps simply by the thought of it—while feeling I have not righteously defended myself. Whenever I felt that I lacked the power to maintain a healthy amount of will, the rehearsal served as psychological support for me. </span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>The dialogues in the piece essentially create an endless conflict and chaos. We strived to embrace it rather than push it out (and laughed often). We tried to find positive elements while staying in confusion and leaving the differences as they are instead of forcing to creating a unity. The strategy to generate a drive for the work was not much different from the one I use to keep my life going—of course; there was an episode caused by excessive immersion.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>One day, I got lost near my studio due to GPS error on my iPhone and set foot in a residential area. There was a group of teenage boys on the front porch of a house. As I passed by them, a boy tried to startle me. He sneaked up on me and screamed ‘Whoa!’. I was startled, but when I saw that the boy looked as though he became awkward by his action I felt friendly and spoke out to him in Korean “wae graeyo?” (why are you doing this?). It wasn’t the first time I was provoked in public in New York, and perhaps I could’ve just ignored the incident, but I reacted simply because of a naive expectation that arose from repeated rehearsals of the piece. I made additional comments in English as I was afraid the kid would think that what I had said was offensive. As I moved on the kids yelled from behind me something like “whaeeeeon.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>The reason why I wanted to create an environment in my work where language loses its original function was perhaps due to a dream to fulfill what someone else worded “living without culture and society.” If that were possible, at least it would’ve been a strategy to protect one self’s heart while learning from conflicts. So to remain open to you.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>I have two months remaining in New York for now. I feel a little more comfortable compared to when I was making that work. As people began to appear as individuals, the feeling of being abandoned by the entire city when hurt by one person abated. </span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span>Today, in a society that’s made by various cultures leaning against each other, we will have no choice but to be a stranger to each other to some degree. What can one do but to continue to open oneself and to hope and assume that the other will reciprocal as there won’t be a relationship without disquiet and wound.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p></p>TSW: Eunjintag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-06-27:5831649:BlogPost:843352018-06-27T20:30:00.000ZLou Mandolinihttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/LindseyMandolini
<p><span style="font-size: 18pt;">Time in the (LEIMAY) Studio with...</span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: 24pt;">Eunjin Choi</span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341907?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341907?profile=original" width="511"></img></a></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
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<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">LEIMAY Studio…</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 18pt;">Time in the (LEIMAY) Studio with...</span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: 24pt;">Eunjin Choi</span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341907?profile=original" target="_self"><img src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341907?profile=original" width="511" class="align-center"/></a></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">LEIMAY Studio Manager <a href="http://conectom.leimay.org/profile/LindseyMandolini" target="_self">Lou Mandolini</a> in conversation with LEIMAY Fellow Eunjin Choi.</span> <span style="font-size: 14pt;">Eunjin is a choreographer, teacher, performer, and all around great human.</span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: left;"><strong>Lou-What is the first thing you do when you begin your rehearsal at CAVE?</strong></li>
</ul>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Eunjin</span>- I drink coffee or tea on one of the chairs next to the CAVE entrance to take a break. On occasions when I can't, I take time to meditate lying on the studio floor. </span></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong>How have weekly rehearsals impacted the way you work?</strong></span></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">It's good that there are continuity and flow to the thread of thought on what I'm working on. Generally for the sake of cutting cost during the production period, one limits the use of the studio. If an artist makes work based on studio rehearsals, then he or she feels a gap between performances. This kind of gap makes continuing to produce work inefficiently and also creates psychological instability for the artist. All experience that stems from happenings in the studio becomes seed and nutrition to the work even if it's listening to music and staring at a space, or walking around. Personally, regular use of studio is something I want to maintain.</span></p>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong>In one sentence, what is at the core of your work? What drives you to create?</strong></span></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 18pt;"><em>Empowering things that are small and weak.</em></span></p>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong>Discuss the use of the body in your practice...</strong></span></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">In my practice, choreography is the fabrication of the body's presence. Although it depends on the piece I'm working on, I use rehearsal time to practice and think about appropriate devices for staging a specific presence.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341968?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="600" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341968?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="600" class="align-center"/></a></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><strong>Tell me about your first experience with LEIMAY, CAVE, or Ximena and Shige?</strong></span></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">I first came to CAVE two years ago during my Movement Research Exchange Program (MRX). At the time I only saw the space and had not met Ximena or Shige. <span class="aBn"><span class="aQJ">Two years later,</span></span> when I came to participate in the program, I met Ximena at a fellow artist's house. I felt generosity and kindness from the first few words Ximena spoke to me. Then I returned to CAVE to maintain its beauty, warmth, and magic.</span></p>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>What does it mean to you to be a producing artist, working collectively, to create SOAK 2018?</strong></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p><span><span style="font-size: 8pt;">Learning how to live together.</span> </span></p>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>If you ran your own space, what would be your focus and how would connect to the community?</strong></li>
</ul>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">I have not thought about owning a space, but if this becomes possible, I would firstly share a studio space that would allow artists to use and maintain and foster their practice regularly. Secondly, I would like for it to be able to host study groups, forums, and discussions regularly to help diverse and active discourse develops. In regards to the community, I would like to see meetings with artists in the community with a communal agenda and discuss the current state of our society and location and planning what artists can do for the community.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 14pt;">Thanks for sitting down with me Eunjin! Learn more about this featured Fellow's artistic practice on her <a href="https://www.choieunjin.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">website</a> and through her <a href="http://conectom.leimay.org/profile/EunjinChoi" target="_self">conectom profile</a>. </span></p>
<p></p>TSW: Marianatag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-06-06:5831649:BlogPost:841762018-06-06T15:30:00.000ZLou Mandolinihttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/LindseyMandolini
<p><span style="font-size: 18pt;">Time in the (LEIMAY) Studio with...</span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: 24pt;">Mariana Taragano </span></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341915?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341915?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="600"></img></a></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">LEIMAY…</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 18pt;">Time in the (LEIMAY) Studio with...</span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: 24pt;">Mariana Taragano </span></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341915?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="600" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341915?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="600" class="align-center"/></a></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">LEIMAY Studio Manager <a href="http://conectom.leimay.org/profile/LindseyMandolini" target="_self">Lou Mandolini</a> in conversation with LEIMAY Fellow Mariana Taragano. Mariana is a movement artist, choreographer, mother, and all around great human.</span></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"></p>
<ul>
<li><strong><span class="s1">LOU- What is the first thing you do when you begin your rehearsal at CAVE?</span></strong></li>
</ul>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s2" style="font-size: 8pt;">MARIANA- I warm up! I try and begin with fifteen minutes of improvisation for myself and the dancers. The idea is that you move through whatever it is that you <i>feel</i> your body needs rather than thinking “this is what I do” or “this is what I have been told to do (as a dancer)”. From there I have set warm-up that we do every single time. It is technique-based, a hybrid of different things I have done (in the past) like ballet and Cunningham. It has the structure of a traditional progression, pliés into tendus, with additional focus the upper body.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<ul>
<li class="p3"><strong><span class="s1">How have weekly rehearsals impacted the way you work?</span></strong></li>
</ul>
<p class="p4"></p>
<p class="p3"><span class="s2" style="font-size: 8pt;">They have given me a really great structure. I was trying for a few years, to work in spaces that I came across or spaces that I taught in but somehow the momentum gets kind of lost within daily life. Just having to come here and rehearse has been really helpful. To really show up and commit, whether I am inspired or not, I have to do it. Show up and do the work. Sometimes I arrive with no energy and no inspiration and those are the best rehearsals.</span></p>
<p class="p3"></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><strong><span class="s1">Just keeping things consistent — whether you have the mental capacity or not</span></strong></span></p>
<p class="p4"></p>
<p class="p3"><span class="s2" style="font-size: 8pt;">Exactly and I think that’s something when you really are a creator that you have to tap into. Of course, some days are better than others but you can’t just wait around for a muse.</span></p>
<p class="p4"></p>
<ul>
<li class="p3"><strong><span class="s1">In one sentence, what is at the core of your work? What drives you to create?</span></strong></li>
</ul>
<p class="p4"></p>
<p class="p3"><em><span class="s2"><span style="font-size: 18pt;">Communicating</span> — <span style="font-size: 18pt;">I am interested in creating work that moves something in the person that is observing it.</span></span></em></p>
<p class="p4"></p>
<p class="p4" style="text-align: center;"><span class="s2"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342023?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="700" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342023?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="700" class="align-center"/></a></span></p>
<p></p>
<ul>
<li class="p3"><strong><span class="s1">Tell me about your first experience with LEIMAY, CAVE, or Ximena and Shige?</span></strong></li>
</ul>
<p class="p4"></p>
<p class="p3"><span class="s2" style="font-size: 8pt;">My first encounter with CAVE was a workshop previous Fellow Danielle Russo (LEIMAY Fellow 2015-2016) about Site-Specific work.</span></p>
<p class="p3"></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><strong><span class="s1">Oh my gosh! I took part of that workshop. I believe you were expecting your first child…</span></strong></span></p>
<p class="p4"></p>
<p class="p3"><span class="s2" style="font-size: 8pt;">That right! That’s how I learned that the space even existed. Afterwards, I started researching the Fellowship and the first time I met Ximena and Shige was during my interview.</span></p>
<p class="p4"></p>
<ul>
<li class="p5"><strong><span class="s3">What does it mean to you to be a producing artist, working collectively, to create SOAK 2018?</span></strong></li>
</ul>
<p class="p6"></p>
<p class="p5"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">On a personal level, it’s an oasis of hope. I know it sounds corny but I think that working as a community and creating something with a group of people that are driven by the goal of sharing and expressing is amazing. Especially in the</span> <span style="font-size: 8pt;">arts world when even to apply for a festival you have to pay. The arts world, I mean the entire world, but especially the arts are so driven by capitalism right now. I wish that more projects, not just creative endeavors, would be done in this way. It’s honest and I think the world needs a bit more of that.</span></p>
<p class="p6"></p>
<ul>
<li class="p5"><strong>Agreed. If you</strong> <strong>ran</strong> <strong>your own space, what would be your focus and how would connect to the community?</strong></li>
</ul>
<p class="p6"></p>
<p class="p5"><span style="font-size: 8pt;">My dream is to actually have a building with different floors in which a variety of art forms are taught. I dream big! I would love to make the arts approachable and accessible to young ages and grow artists that will stay in the community that could eventually grow into being a company. It’s important to me that it comes from the school first and develops and not the other way around like an existing theater or dance company that creates a school. To start when they are children and create something out of that. I grew up in Argentina and I was raised in Israel but most of my professional career was spent in London. I went back to Israel for a few years and now I’m here. I don’t know where I want the space to be but definitely a smaller town where the organization has the potential to be the heart of the community. Now, all we need is money for a building. [<i>laughs</i>]</span></p>
<p class="p5"></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 14pt;">Thank you so much for meeting with me early this morning. Enjoy your rehearsal! You can catch Mariana's work <em>In:Fantasy</em> at SOAK<em>, </em>June 15.</span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"></p>PROCESS // Notes from Inside the Boxtag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-04-05:5831649:BlogPost:839112018-04-05T16:15:39.000ZKate Ladenheimhttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/KateLadenheim
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341875?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341875?profile=RESIZE_480x480" style="padding: 2px;" width="400"></img></a></span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">For the past year, I’ve been working on a piece called</span> <i><span style="font-weight: 400;">Glass</span></i><span style="font-weight: 400;">: a multi-disciplinary dance performance that addresses the concept of a glass ceiling and the myriad ways that women internalize misogyny…</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341875?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341875?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-full" style="padding: 2px;"/></a></span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">For the past year, I’ve been working on a piece called</span> <i><span style="font-weight: 400;">Glass</span></i><span style="font-weight: 400;">: a multi-disciplinary dance performance that addresses the concept of a glass ceiling and the myriad ways that women internalize misogyny within patriarchal constructs. The project exists as a standalone film series, a staged dance, and a film and performance installation.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">This installation recently toured to the Performance Arcade, a New Zealand festival which puts works of art inside of shipping containers alongside the Wellington Waterfront. The festival saw nearly 70,000 audience members this year. I (the artistic director of this work) performed in this installation alongside collaborator Bre Short, alternating performance shifts during 13 hour festival days.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">When people enter our installation, they pass through white curtains into the shipping container and see a film projected downwards onto a floor covered in scattered papers. This film shows movement shot from an overhead perspective. Taped to the walls are stories from the film’s collaborators about their experiences with misogyny; everything from professional insults to micro aggressions to outright abuse. There is a table, where a woman in a white pantsuit is seated. In front of her is a stack of papers and four bottles of nail polish, and a glass pane upon which is projected a film, reflective of the floor projection but with a different perspective. She is framed by a square of cold lighting.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">The installation functions on a loop, which includes a solo dance and music pulling sounds from Frank Sinatra, the dancers’ voices and the sounds of nail polish bottles. The rest of the performance centers around a seemingly simple, yet intimate and layered interaction: as performers, we paint the nails of audience members.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I provide this information as context for what follows: a few of my most memorable interactions from inside the box.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><b>One</b></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">There’s a young girl in a bright pink bear suit. She has</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">f<span style="text-decoration: line-through;">ood on her face</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">freckles. She is absolutely thrilled to have her nails done and chats the entire time, telling me how the last time she painted her nails it was a lavender color, though her favorite colors are blue and magenta and how EXCITED she is that the color we have is such a lovely shade of</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Essie: With the Band</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">magenta.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">She barely watches the film. She reads nothing. She walks away, visibly elated.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><b>Two</b></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">A bunch of</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">sugar high</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">loud</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">boys</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">kids come stomping through. They pull the curtain back and look at me through the glass. They don’t come inside, just stare at the scene before them.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">After a few giggly moments I move. They all shriek, exclaiming, “it moved!”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">A few more kids peek in,</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">apparently amazed that I am, in fact, a real breathing human</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">laughing. I try to ask if they’d like to have their nails done, but again they shriek, exclaiming, “it talks, too!”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><b>Three</b></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">An older woman comes inside with her friend. Her friend gets her nails done first, silently. Then, she sits down. She smiles wide, compliments me on the installation. I thank her,</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">hoping she’s not going to ask me to start explaining what it’s all about</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">politely.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">After I finish, she tells me, “In my entire life I’ve never had my nails painted. Not even when I got married, I barely even brushed my hair.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">am not sure how to respond in character</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">smile at her. She says, “This is so lovely. I feel like a really glamorous lady!”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">She picks up her bag with her wrist and elbow, carefully avoiding her new glamorous nails. She floats out to find her friend, who’s already gone.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><b>Four</b></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">A short guy with a ponytail comes in. He has one finger painted, so he’s been here before. After the room empties, he sits down in front of me.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">It’s</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">creepy</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">somewhat unsettling.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“Back for more?” I ask, wondering if I shouldn’t have said something</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">sexy</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">suggestive, even in character, when I’m alone. I might be</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">asking for it</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">inviting</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">gross</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">deviant behavior.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I’m careful to stay short, confrontational, professional - in character - with him. As he asks me to walk him through my artistic choices,</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">making me feel less in control</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">intruding on my scene. He seemed to be</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">flirting with me</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">invested in the work. He asks me if I ever need help, for example if I ever hire interns. “Yeah, I’d love an intern,” I laugh.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“How can I apply?” He asks.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“Our website is on the door.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“Okay. You can expect to hear from me soon.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Finally</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="text-decoration: line-through;">He’s leaving.</span> “Great, thanks.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">He stands up. Stops. Leans back over, in</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">my space</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">the space between the hanging glass and the table. “Do you want it in any specific format?”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">“Get out.”</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">“No.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">He leaves. I breathe again,</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">realizing</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">control is a carefully crafted illusion, even in the space I’ve made commenting on that very idea</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">my right shoulder has been twisted forward and lifted up the entire time.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><b>Five</b></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Another girl, younger. Maybe 4 years old. She comes in with her dad. She’s painfully shy, stares at me unspeaking because</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">we’re taught from a young age to be afraid of women in positions of power</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">i’m in character. But when her dad tells her she can get her nails done she grins and sits down.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">She’s barely taller than the table. I can hardly reach her tiny hands. She’s so still for someone so young.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">She looks at the film and back at me with two of the widest eyes I’ve ever seen. I feel like she’s intuiting something deep down inside of her tiny body, but know</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">that’s stupid</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">she’s probably still just afraid of</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">strong women</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">me.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">She runs back to her dad. “Show me your nails,” he says. She shows him, smiling, proud. He scoops her up, and kisses her, and tells her she’s beautiful. Carrying her, he leaves.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I’m left alone in the box, sitting behind my pane of glass, contemplating meta-narratives, <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"> </span></span><span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">ashamed of myself</span></span><span style="font-weight: 400;"> deeply conflicted.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><b>Six</b></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">A man and a woman peek through the curtain. I peer back at them through the glass. The man tries to walk inside, the woman pulls</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">her boyfriend</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">him violently away by the elbow.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I don’t see them again.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><b>Seven</b></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Ponytail is back. He’s been sitting in the corner for almost an hour. He’s seen the entire performance cycle twice. I’m</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">c<span style="text-decoration: line-through;">reeped out</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">really not sure why he’s been there so long.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">When a bunch of</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">teenage girls</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">people come in, he gets up and walks away.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">None of them want their nails painted.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><b>Eight</b></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">A man walks in with a few friends. He sits down and asks me what my installation is about.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Truly,</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">nothing annoys me more than this question</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">I’m curious to hear what he’s confused about, so I ask him what he thinks it means.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“That all men are horrible.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“That’s not what this is about. Some men are horrible. Some women are horrible. Most people are not horrible but do horrible things.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“But all of the stories are about nasty things that men have done to women.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">“Why do you think that might be, genius?”</span></span><span style="font-weight: 400;"> </span><span style="font-weight: 400;">“How do you know that everyone who wrote these stories are women?”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“They’re your stories, right?”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“One of them is mine. The rest are collected.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">He thinks for a minute. Looks at the film. I</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">break character</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">say, “I’ve been incredibly disrespected by men. I’ve been incredibly disrespected by women following the same patriarchal constructs.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“Oh, yes. Two women together are much worse than a man and a woman together.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">“You’ve entirely missed the point, idiot.”</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">“What makes you say that?”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“I have two sisters and one brother.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">“You’re the fucking worst.”</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">“Clever.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“Which story is yours?”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I smile</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">coldly</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">politely. “Guess,” I say.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“The first one on the right.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">“I’m so fucking annoyed you guessed right.”</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">“Good guess.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">He stands up, satisfied with himself. “Well, this is really cool, and beautiful. Thanks.”</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">I’m furious.</span></span></p>
<p></p>
<p><b>Nine</b></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Douchebag</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">Ponytail is back, again.</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">Did I invite this?</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">He waits until the container has cleared out, and sits down in front of me. He has a folder in his hand. I’m</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">afraid</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">preparing myself to leave the container.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Bre comes in; we’re meant to change shifts. I know she’ll be</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">in danger</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">alone with him. I</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">try to apologize just by looking at her</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">look at her. I leave.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="text-decoration: line-through;">am really afraid</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">run to security. They go to our container right away, and stand outside of the container until he leaves. Bre is left to resume breathing. He’s left</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">me</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">her his resume.**</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><b>Ten</b></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">A man comes in with his son, a toddler. He immediately sees the floor projection, and below the projected dancers.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">As they move, he jumps on them, seemingly trying to catch them.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">“Honey, be careful, this is someone’s art,” says Dad, scooping up his son.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">They leave. I’m left alone behind the glass,</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">wondering if Dad will tell Son why it’s unkind to stomp on women or if he’ll grow up thinking it’s all a fun game</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">again contemplating meta narratives.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><b>Eleven</b></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">I’m inside the box, but not</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">angry</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">in character. I’m watching Bre perform. Eight days, and nearly 250 loops later, we’re on our last interaction. All of our papers are a crumpled, dirty, torn up mess.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">There are two people watching - they’ve been inside since I was performing, but they’re</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">not at all creepy</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">genuinely excited.</span></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Bre and I are</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">not quite ready for this to be over</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">exhausted. She laughs. Papers fly. Music swells. We walk out of the box for the last time.</span></p>
<p><br/><br/><br/><br/><br/></p>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">**To</span> <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">Douchebag’s</span></span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">Ponytail’s credit, we had a two hour long conversation following this interaction where we talked about his experience inside of the installation, and why his behavior made us uncomfortable. The conversation was</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">hard for me</span> <span style="font-weight: 400;">actually very open and honest. Leaving our conversation, I was left with the impression that Ponytail was impacted by our work, anc can only hope that he understands the implications of his actions.</span></p>TSW: Karritag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-03-28:5831649:BlogPost:835882018-03-28T19:30:00.000ZLou Mandolinihttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/LindseyMandolini
<p><span style="font-size: 18pt;"> Time in the (LEIMAY) Studio with...</span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="text-decoration: underline; font-size: 24pt;">Karri Jinkins</span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"></p>
<p class="p1" style="text-align: center;"><b><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341867?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-center" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341867?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750"></img></a></b></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">LEIMAY Studio Manager…</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 18pt;"> Time in the (LEIMAY) Studio with...</span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"><span style="text-decoration: underline; font-size: 24pt;">Karri Jinkins</span></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"></p>
<p class="p1" style="text-align: center;"><b><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341867?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="750" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74341867?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750" class="align-center"/></a></b></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">LEIMAY Studio Manager <a href="http://conectom.leimay.org/profile/LindseyMandolini" target="_self">Lou Mandolini</a> in conversation with March's featured renter Karri Jinkins. Karri is a yoga practitioner, writer, mother, and all around great human.</span></p>
<p class="p1"></p>
<ul>
<li class="p1"><b>LOU- What first brought you to yoga?</b></li>
</ul>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1">KARRI- Well, I started doing yoga in 1990. I was in college, in the Theater Department of the University of Wisconsin, and I had terrible panic attacks. I had a professor that was into Kalaripayattu, an Indian form of martial arts, and he introduced me to yoga. Practicing helped my anxiety and I continued (studying), on and off for years.</p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<ul>
<li class="p1"><b>Can you tell me about Ashtanga and what sets it apart from other methods of yoga?</b></li>
</ul>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><em>It’s a very specific, set routine of postures that you do with the breath and a very specific count. And through doing that, its supposed to align and cleanse your body but also quiet your mind.</em> When I came to New York, that was around '92, I started training at Jivamukti. The founders, Sharon Gannon and David Life, and the community there were all practicing Ashtanga. Jivamukti was the only place to truly practice yoga in the nineties. Sharon and David were students of <span>Sri K. Pattabhi Jois and I realized I wanted to practice his methods.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span>I</span> went to Indian and studied with Pattabhi Jois in Mysore and went back and forth for many years. Jois passed away in 2009 but his grandson took over for him. I see his grandson in New York once a year</p>
<p class="p1"></p>
<p class="p1"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342030?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="700" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342030?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="700" class="align-center"/></a></p>
<ul>
<li class="p1"><b>Do you participate in any other movement practices?</b></li>
</ul>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1">My son and I love to dance. We have a nightly dance part in the apartment, he’s seven.</p>
<p class="p1">His new favorite song is “God’s Plan” by Drake. He loves it! He likes to turn all of the lights off and dance. It's our favorite. </p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<ul>
<li class="p1"><b>We love having you as a weekly renter, what do enjoy most about teaching your class at CAVE?</b></li>
</ul>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1">I love so many things about it. In fact, sometimes I think about doing a whole morning Mysore Program here! I just love how it's raw but very intimate. It feels cozy and clean. I love the dramatic white curtains. It’s the perfect space because its big enough for 20 people and I certainly wouldn’t want any more than that. I love the special touches that it has, it’s very unique. My students love it too!</p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<ul>
<li class="p1"><b>Any advice for someone who has never taken yoga before?</b></li>
</ul>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1">Don’t be afraid, there’s nothing complicated and there’s nothing esoteric or secretive. All you have to do is move your body and breathe. It’s all about whatever <i>your</i> body can do and not what everyone else’s body can do. It’s all about doing it, not the theory. By doing it you will understand the theory rather than the theory understanding the yoga.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> You aren’t going to get it that way.</p>
<p class="p1"></p>
<p class="p1" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342060?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="750" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342060?profile=RESIZE_1024x1024" width="750" class="align-center"/></a></p>
<p class="p1"></p>
<ul>
<li class="p1"><strong>Karri, thank you for meeting with me and allowing me to attend your class as a guest. LEIMAY is happy to have you and your student's positive energy in the space each week. Thank you for respecting CAVE during each session taught at 58 Grand.</strong></li>
</ul>
<p class="p1"></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">To learn more about Karri and when you can catch her class visit: <a href="http://karrijinkins.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">karrijinkins.com</a></span></p>
<p class="p1"></p>
<p class="p1"></p>
<p style="text-align: right;"></p>Choreography and Gender: Still Looking for the Female Choreographerstag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-02-18:5831649:BlogPost:837512018-02-18T18:59:54.000ZMariana Taraganohttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/MarianaTaragano
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342196?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342196?profile=RESIZE_480x480" style="padding: 2px;" width="400"></img> <span style="font-size: 8pt;">ODC/Dance; photo Andrew Weeks. Courtesy of Jacob's Pillow</span></a></p>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p>Whether familiar with the dance world or not, it probably won’t come as a surprise to most readers that the majority of the dance industry work-force is female. In fact, according to Data USA<sup>12</sup>, as much as eighty-five percent of the workers in…</p>
<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342196?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342196?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-full" style="padding: 2px;"/><span style="font-size: 8pt;">ODC/Dance; photo Andrew Weeks. Courtesy of Jacob's Pillow</span></a></p>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p>Whether familiar with the dance world or not, it probably won’t come as a surprise to most readers that the majority of the dance industry work-force is female. In fact, according to Data USA<sup>12</sup>, as much as eighty-five percent of the workers in the dance industry are women. However, when examining the past seasons of some of the most important presenting venues in the Northeast region of the United States it becomes clear that gender numbers shift dramatically when looking at successful choreographers. </p>
<p> </p>
<p></p>
<p><u>The numbers:</u></p>
<p>The gender imbalance in high scale dance companies is not new. In 1976 Wendy Perron and Stephanie Woodard wrote a study called ‘Is there a bias against women in the dance world?’. The article showed clear data by which male choreographers were getting more opportunities and grants, and therefor enjoying more success than their female counterparts. Perron revised her article in 2001 to find that little had changed in nearly thirty years<sup>10</sup>. </p>
<p></p>
<p>The early 2000's seem to have been an era of re-awakening to the gender issue in the dance world. This was the time in which several female choreographers including JoAnna Mendl Shaw<sup>14</sup>, Janis Brenner<sup>15</sup>, Ellis Wood<sup>16</sup> and Heidi Latsky<sup>17</sup> formed The Gender Project: a collective that gathered data, participated in panels and created work geared towards changing the face of gender preference in the dance world<sup>13</sup>.<sup> </sup>In 2001,<sup> </sup>Scherr from the New York Times accused the Endowment for the Arts of favoring male choreographers (as for the last five years, the Endowment for the Arts has given balanced grants to male and female choreographers for the production of new work). </p>
<p></p>
<p>So, did the awakening of the early 2000's work? Is the situation more balanced now? “I don’t think so” says Heidi Latsky and she may be right. After examining the past seasons of some of the most important presenting venues in the Northeast it is clear that male choreographers still dominate the high-scale performance world. </p>
<p></p>
<p>At the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), for example, only three works by female choreographers were presented in the 2017 fall season compared to ten male choreographers. One of the female choreographers presented was Pina Bausch, a world famous and frequently produced BAM artist.</p>
<p></p>
<p>The Joyce Theater did not manage to produce a more balanced program: in the spring-summer season of 2017 only one third of the choreographers showcased were women. The current season has seen a slight improvement with eight out of nineteen choreographers being female. The American Dance Festival (ADF) continues the trend with nine female choreographers showcasing work compared to nineteen men. </p>
<p></p>
<p>The only stage that was examined for the purpose of this article that has a majority of female choreographers in their program was Jacob’s Pillow upcoming festival. Pamela Tatge, artistic director of Jacob’s Pillow as of 2017, says that diversity is indeed something she considers when creating the festival program. While she does not look at gender at the first stages of selection, she does look at gender, nationality and internationality when making final selections. Whilst authenticity, intention and the relevance of the work in question to the present times are the main factors for her choices it is important to Tatge that a diverse program is presented. </p>
<p></p>
<p>It would have been interesting to understand the process for selection at BAM, The Joyce and ADF. However after a short e-mail correspondence with all three establishments not one of them managed to make time to share their thoughts. </p>
<p></p>
<p>While the imbalance between male and female choreographers represented in important venues in the United States is startling, things look even worse across the ocean<sup>5, 6</sup>. Tamara Rojo, former principal dancer of the Royal Opera House (ROH) and current artistic director of the English National Ballet has curated a triple bill, <em>She Said</em>, entirely dedicated to female choreographers. Rojo states that she was compelled to curate the evening after noticing that in the twenty years she had danced with the ROH she had not once danced a piece created by a woman. </p>
<p></p>
<p>The research scope of this article is limited. However a more extensive research was conducted by Eliza Larson<sup>8</sup>. Larson states that “though dance classrooms and studios are filled with women, the […] study indicates that a majority of the most visible and well-funded choreographers in this country are men. Men receive prestigious choreographic opportunities at a rate disproportionate to their numeric minority in the field.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p></p>
<p><u>The disappearance of female choreographers</u></p>
<p>A factor contributing to the imbalance between male and female choreographers in the ballet world may have to do with the male roles within the ballet companies themselves, where “[t]heir workload is lighter, the competition is nowhere as intense as it is among those ethereal women in tutus. So the men in ballet have time to develop their creativity, to experiment with choreography, to get out into the non-ballet world and develop other skills.”<sup>3</sup> Kourlas adds that “[m]ale dancers simply aren’t as busy as their female counterparts, who, on top of everything else, are trained to be obedient and not to step out of line.”<sup>7</sup></p>
<p></p>
<p>While these explanations might shed some light on the imbalance in the ballet world, it does not explain the disappearance of female choreographers in the contemporary dance world. Often the gender distribution of members in dance companies are even and roles are rarely decided upon through gender. </p>
<p></p>
<p>Mendl Shaw believes that part of the problem is women’s discomfort with aggressive ambition: “I think that women are uncomfortable with competition. They are masters of being polite and they have been raised to be indirect. And in the highly competitive world of who gets recognised you actually need a robust ego and a tremendous willingness to promote yourself.” Or, in some cases, you might be one of the chosen few – which she calls “just being very lucky.”</p>
<p></p>
<p>Latsky has also noticed her tendency to be apologetic through her career: “I believe in my work, I really do, but I am not very good at selling it”. </p>
<p></p>
<p>Psychologist Alice Eagly has investigated the connections between gender and leadership and she emphasizes how one’s gender affects his or her perceived leadership success. Eagly and Karau claim that women are known for their “primary concern with the welfare of other people – for example, affectionate, helpful, kind, sympathetic, interpersonally sensitive, nurturant and gentle”. Men, on the other hand, usually pose “primarily assertive, controlling, and a confident tendencies – for example, aggressive, ambitious, dominant, forceful, independent, self-sufficient, self-confident, and prone to act as a leader.”<sup>4</sup></p>
<p></p>
<p>Latsky however believes that the new generation of female choreographers are more assertive as they have been taught to speak up for themselves. Choreographer Kate Ladenhaim from The People Movers<sup>18</sup>, who has been voted 25 to watch by Dance Magazine and is fast advancing in the dance world, says that she is indeed often perceived as “pushy”. </p>
<p></p>
<p>Eagly’s claims resonate when reading the writings of dance historian Lynn Garafola, who has noted that while women are prominent in the fringe of dance, particularly in projects that require exploration and innovation, once their endeavor proves successful, men step in: "[i]n smaller companies, in newer companies, in companies that have an experimental dimension – you'll find women choreographers there. But once ballet is institutionalised, it becomes a man's world."<sup>5</sup></p>
<p></p>
<p>In fact, there is no lack of female choreographers in the contemporary world. The issue is that while there are many small and mid-scale projects and companies led by women most of the high-scale, heavily funded and well-presented companies are led by men.</p>
<p>Another factor to consider is that of the child-bearing years which, just like in most other professions, seems to lower the priority of the career for woman, at least for some years. Those years are usually critical years for a career. </p>
<p></p>
<p>Child-bearing years have a great impact on men’s relationships with their careers as well. In most industries, these are the years in which men are promoted and make big leaps forward at work. We cannot ignore the social pressure that exists, even in 2018, for men to financially provide for their families. It is possible that this pressure is beneficial for a man’s career as it motivates men to push their vocations further and succeed enough to step into the role of the traditional main family provider. </p>
<p> </p>
<p></p>
<p><u>The importance of female choreographers</u></p>
<p>People respond differently to male choreography than they do to female choreography. This is usually also true for books written by man and films led by male directors. </p>
<p>If we live in a world of supply and demand then it only makes sense that male choreographers enjoy greater success than their female counterparts. After all, as Tatge mentioned in our conversation, subjective, personal taste is involved in work selection. Perhaps male choreographers are successful simply because their work is better received by audiences. If that is the case, is there anything active that really needs to be done to balance the gender representation in the dance world?</p>
<p></p>
<p>I believe that it is important to take action. The audience’s preference to male work is not coincidental. Our culture and media have been dominated by male voices since their inception. Audiences have been experiencing a male point of view for such a long time that it has now become their preference, their understanding of what good dance looks like. It is only natural that audiences will find female choreography hard to relate to. If female choreography is not something that is being widely experienced, those female sensibilities will feel alien to most audiences.</p>
<p></p>
<p>In addition, Artists of course create work based on personal sensibilities. When a man creates a dance, it is created from a male perspective; those male perspectives become the dominant lens through which audiences see created work. Audiences are then only experiencing half of the expressivity of the human condition that exists in real life. This creates a distorted perception of reality that leads to serious implications on the world’s everyday way of living.</p>
<p></p>
<p>Another reason female-led work tend to be less noticeable is that female choreographers do not get the same financial opportunities that men do, so they have fewer resources, and as a result possibly less motivation to push themselves forward: opportunity creates quality. </p>
<p> </p>
<p></p>
<p><u>Bringing female choreographers to the front</u></p>
<p>Choreographer Heidi Latsky opted out of The Gender Project because she felt her voice “was being compromised” due to her being a choreographer herself. It was hard to fight for more visibility for female choreographers in general being a female choreographer herself. She felt that this agenda should be pushed forward by an objective body. </p>
<p></p>
<p>Dance / NYC is such an objective art entity that has recently conducted a research project on the workforce and demographics of dance<sup>19</sup>. The study included looking at fiscally-sponsored dance artists and projects<sup>21</sup>. One of the outcomes of their research was to establish. Part of the recommendations of their research has been to establish the Dance Advancement Fund<sup>20</sup> that aims “to address the inequitable distribution of resources in the dance field […] Through its strategic support of small-budget dance groups (with budgets of less than $1 million), the initiative will not only advance the segment’s artistic development and delivery but also contribute to the field’s overall diversity, sustainability, resilience, and health.”</p>
<p></p>
<p>While the research mentioned above did not focus solely on gender it is a great example of how entities like Dance / NYC and Dance / USA can have a positive impact and help promote equal opportunities to diverse artists. </p>
<p></p>
<p>But funding opportunities are not enough. Choreographer Kate Ladenhaim believes that presenters must take some of the responsibility as they are the gatekeepers of what is seen by audiences. She also believes that educational institutions are not helping the current situation. She remembers coming back to the Boston Conservatory as an alumni to watch a graduate show and discover that all dances performed were choreographed by men: “that is what I was taught to believe is good dance”. Continuing to teach male’s repertory in disproportion to female repertory will not help the situation. In fact, the whole dance field will benefit if lecturers choose to voice the gender issue with students openly. Instead of teaching female dancers to fit into an outdated idea of how a female dancer should look, behave and move they could choose to create a female dancer for the choreographers of the future.</p>
<p></p>
<p>Lastly, of course, women have to look inwards. “I came to the conclusion, personally, that the journey is yours to take.” Says Mendl Shaw, “Yes, it is harder for women and if you want to take the journey you have to push harder. You have to be better and you have to push harder. I did not come away [from The Gender Project] saying that the world is unfair. I came away desiring to look at my own behavior and figuring out where I was backing away as a woman.” </p>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><u>Further Reading:</u></span></p>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[1] <a href="http://www.pointemagazine.com/women-dance-leaders-on-ballets-gender-imbalance-2507841353.html">Brandt, A. ‘Women Dance Leaders on Ballet’s Gender Imbalance’, Pointe Magazine, 11.8.17</a></span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[2] <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/26/arts/dance/breaking-the-glass-slipper-where-are-the-female-choreographers.html">Cooper, M. ‘Breaking the Glass Slipper: Where Are the Female Choreographers?’, The New York Times, 6.23.16</a></span></h1>
<p></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[3] <a href="https://www.elgaronline.com/view/journals/lath/4-2/lath.2016.02.01.xml">DeFrank-Cole, L. and Nicholson, R. K. ‘The slow-changing face of leadership in ballet: an interdisciplinary approach to analysing women’s roles’ in Marturano, A., Harvey, M. and Price, T. <em>Leadership and the Humanities</em>. Vol. 4 No. 2, 2016, pp. 73–91.</a></span></p>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[4] <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12088246">Eagly, A. H. and Karau S. J. ‘Role congruity theory of prejudice toward female leaders.’ <em>Psychological Review.</em> July 2002, pp. 573-598.</a></span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[5] <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2013/apr/28/women-choreographers-glass-ceiling">Jennings, L. ‘Sexism in dance: where are all the female choreographers?’, The Guardian, 4.28.13</a></span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;"> </span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[6] <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com/harpreet-kaur/gender-inequality-in-cont_b_10054240.html">Kaur, H. ‘Gender Inequality in Contemporary Dance’, The Huffington Post, 12.6.17</a></span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;"> </span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[7] <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/26/arts/dance/ballet-luminaries-weigh-in-on-a-conspicuous-absence.html">Kourlas, G. ‘Dance Luminaries Weigh in on the Conspicuous Absence of Female Choreographers’, The New York Times, 6.23.16</a></span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[8] <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Dance-Gender-Evidence-Based-Wendy-Oliver/dp/0813062667">Larson, E. ‘Behind</a> <u>the Curtain: Exploring Gender Equity in Dance among Choreographers and Artistic Directors’ in</u> <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/results?section1=author&search1=%20Wendy%20%20Oliver">Wendy Oliver</a><u>, W. and </u><a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/results?section1=author&search1=%20Doug%20%20Risner">Risner</a><u>, D. Dance and Gender: <em>An Evidence-Based Approach. 2017, pp. 39-59.</em></u></span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><em> </em></span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[9] <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/12/arts/dance/of-women-men-and-ballet-in-the-21st-century.html">Macaulay, A. ‘Of Women, Men and Ballet in the 21st Century’, The New York Times, 1.12.17</a></span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[10] <a href="http://wendyperron.com/is-there-a-bias-against-women-in-dance-then-now/">Perron W. ‘Are Women Dancers Still Discriminated Against?’, 2001</a></span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[11] <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/04/arts/dance-making-a-career-with-one-eye-on-a-gender-gap.html">Scheer, A. ‘DANCE; Making a Career With One Eye on a Gender Gap’, The New York Times, 11.4.01</a></span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;"> </span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><u>Further Information</u></span></h1>
<p><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[12] <a href="https://datausa.io/profile/soc/272030/">Data USA</a></span></p>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[13] The Gender Project’s trancripts can be found at the Lincoln Center library</span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[14] <a href="https://vimeo.com/theequusprojects/about">JoAnna Mendl Shaw’s Equus Projects</a></span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[15] <a href="http://www.janisbrenner.com/">Janis Brenner</a></span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[16] <a href="http://www.wooddance.net/home.asp">Ellis Wood</a></span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[17] <a href="http://heidilatskydance.org/">Heidi Latsky</a></span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[18] <a href="http://thepeoplemovers.co/">Kate Ladenhaim and The People Movers</a></span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[19] <a href="https://www.dance.nyc/advocacy-and-research/research/2016/10/State-of-NYC-Dance-and-Workforce-Demographics/">Dance / NYC Reserch</a></span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[20] <a href="https://www.dance.nyc/funds/danceadvancement">Advancement Fund</a></span></h1>
<h1><span style="font-size: 8pt;">[21] <a href="https://www.councilofnonprofits.org/tools-resources/fiscal-sponsorship-nonprofits">What is a fiscally-sponsored project?</a></span></h1>ESSAYS // On stillness and touch: biodynamic performancetag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-02-15:5831649:BlogPost:835532018-02-15T05:16:48.000ZSophia Treanorhttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/SophiaTreanor
<p class="p1"><span class="s1"><b><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342020?profile=original" target="_self"><img class="align-full" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342020?profile=RESIZE_480x480" style="padding: 2px;" width="400"></img></a></b></span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1"><b>Stillness: in biodynamic craniosacral therapy and improvisational performance</b></span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1">“Space and silence are two aspects of the same thing. The same no-thing. They are externalization of inner space and inner silence, which…</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1"><b><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342020?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="400" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342020?profile=RESIZE_480x480" width="400" class="align-full" style="padding: 2px;"/></a></b></span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1"><b>Stillness: in biodynamic craniosacral therapy and improvisational performance</b></span></p>
<p class="p1"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">“Space and silence are two aspects of the same thing. The same no-thing. They are externalization of inner space and inner silence, which is stillness: the infinitely creative womb of all existence.” </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">—Eckhart Tolle</span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1">“I have often wondered whether especially those days when we are forced to remain idle are not precisely the days spent in the most profound activity. Whether our actions themselves, even if they do not take place until later, are nothing more than the last reverberations of a vast movement that occurs within us during idle days.<br/> In any case, it is very important to be idle with confidence, with devotion, possibly even with joy. The days when even our hands do not stir are so exceptionally quiet that it is hardly possible to raise them without hearing a whole lot.” <br/> ― <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7906.Rainer_Maria_Rilke">Rainer Maria Rilke</a>, <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/310057">Letters on Life</a></span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Stillness as the void: that which<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> existed before there was light and from which all creation arose.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> A still, empty, infinite space that begets life somehow—the space in between.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> I think of that place in myself, in my core, that witnesses internal movement.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> It feels like a little chamber at the center of a compass.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> I think of the eye of the storm—the center point around which the vortex is formed.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> In embryological terms, this feels analogous to the center axis that is created in the conceptus when it spins counter-clockwise. I wonder at this fact.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Stillness the listener.</span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Stillness as a meeting place: a quiet place where one can meet one’s self or another for a deeper, unqualified relationship.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> Stillness releases us from conditionality and reactivity.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> Healing happens here, as does that improvisational propeller—throwing me into action as response, without directives or intention to build.</span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Stillness as spontaneity: the buoyant nothingness from which organic movement and change can arise.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> In performance, stillness with a partner is the opportunity to silently feel the overlap of existence, almost as if you step into a shared mind so that you are a part of the same improvisation, imagination, dimension of reality. </span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Stillness as humility:<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> Taking time to shift into a different relationship with one’s surroundings catalyzes a huge change, especially in a healing context.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> Rather than beginning with a false and often egoistic relationship to a situation that is based on the idea that I have control over what is happening and what will happen, if I take time to be still and quiet in myself, to release preconceived notions, I have the opportunity to look and to listen.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> I begin to observe many things I would not have noticed at all, had I carried along in the same manner.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> The world begins to take me by surprise and the subtler motions around and within present themselves to me. </span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Stillness as paradox: we are never still.<a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342110?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="200" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342110?profile=RESIZE_320x320" width="200" class="align-left"/></a></span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Stillness became a haven for me when I was a child—I felt it in the hillsides surrounding my house, in clusters of trees and in the empty creek bed.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> Of course the wind still blew and birds made their calls occasionally, but these nature sounds and ruffles felt eternal.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> The peace and openness in these relatively still places nourished something in me.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> I first began learning about the practice of stillness in Buddhist meditation.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> Phrases like “stilling the mind” and “coming into the present moment” became mysterious but familiar friends.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> I came to know these experiences as attuning to what is, rather than what we wish or fear, but it wasn’t until I was introduced to the idea of spaciousness within my mind and body experience that I really became aware of the stillness…<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> I wonder when that stillness goes from being the given state of being to being the desired state of being.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> Somewhere in childhood, I presume, sometime when the future plan or past progression takes on more significance than present stillness.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> At times I feel like a boulder rolling down a hill, hurtling through time and space, bouncing off other boulders occasionally or crushing the flowers.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> And sometimes I don’t, sometimes I feel like a part of the hill.</span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Dr. Rollin Becker, a biodynamic craniosacral therapist, speaks on stillness as an element of change….“I get my hands under the given area of problem and I try to be aware of stillness.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> Not a still point, but a stillness that is that individual.” In his practice, the stillness “motivates all that is and is the source of all energy for all body physiology.” and defines health as being “related to a return to the freedom of interchange between body physiology and stillness.”<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> This points to a relationship between stillness and our origin, whether that is pre-Big Bang or the day-long stillness that follows conception, before our embryonic cells begin multiplying.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> As I explore stillness, I feel I am wandering around in it, feeling its rhythmic interchange with matter and movement.</span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1"><a href="http://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/310057"></a></span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1"><b>Experiential notes from stillness:</b></span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">To expand into a wide perceptual field is a delicious dissolving.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> Stillness abounds, and spacial ease defines my experience.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> Somehow I begin to feel held, like a great mother is giving me an energetic massage from hundreds of miles away, stretching my cosmic fascia.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> I began to drift, to go into a subconscious state, losing track of my sensual and solid tether to the world.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> The fluids take the reigns and pores widen. Time to check in with the environment…I hang out in this threshold for a while, feeling like I could go on for an eternity, other beings around me moving and going about their business, me in this dynamic spacious stillness.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> I wonder what it would be like for someone to enter the room…they surely would feel it too. Would it be disorienting? Would they feel stoned too? Would we read each other without having to speak much? This feels like mystical state of being. I open myself to being way out there in the cosmic field and the room and in my body.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> A buzzing emerges. Bringing my attention back into my direct environment feels compressive, like pulling myself into a contraction, claustrophobic around my head.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> But my body still feels so easy.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> As I write this, I am attempting to release the pulling feeling and just soften the cosmic field, like softening hands, to become more uniformly present in my direct environment.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> Is it important for everybody to “come back into the room?” Or can those of us who are so comfortable and blissful out here function in our spaciousness?</span></p>
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<p><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342125?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="200" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342125?profile=RESIZE_320x320" width="200" class="align-right"/></a></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">This feels like an infinite plane…fluid dynamics, sensory perception come in and out of prevalence, like my body is working things out on the way to infinity as the wavs move up and down.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> There is a cumulative feeling to it—that long tide grows in it’s infinity by unraveling within the fluid world. That diffuse, champagne feeling permeates my body, the boundaries of my body disappearing, and then a knot of potency shows up in the vicinity of some problematic area. The potency-feeling begins to grow in this area, as if it is leaking out of a cave or hollow or reservoir. At a certain point of leaking, there is a breathless edge of a cliff moment when my system reaches the unknown—my mind chirps in “what to do next?”—and then a massive discharge of sorts courses through my body in an instant, bringing me back to my body as structures reorganize.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> I am made of stars, and I am the reflection of stars on water.</span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Feeling the soles of my feet against socks, shoes, floor, earth. Feeling the weight of my body supported by the chair, table, ground. The contact of my skin with surfaces below, above, around it. Feeling the connection between my head and tail—that my head is supported all the way down to the tail, then down to the soles of the feet. Listening to the sounds in the room, the sounds outside. Softly welcoming in my peripheral vision.</span></p>
<p class="p2"></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">Turning my head and feeling the space between my head and shoulders. Back body present, under arms and cascading side bodies present. Chest as a cliffside, and pelvic bowl as a fountain of warm wellness. Appreciating something beautiful in the room, the state of the floor, the way the lighting falls on the objects in the room.</span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1">These are the sensations that come up as I ground, entering a quieter space of movement bubbling like a thick porridge.</span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1"><b>Integrating:</b></span></p>
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<p class="p1"><span class="s1">I am beginning to understand my role in the studio and in the treatment room.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> As I rest my hands on someone’s body, joined by the fulcrum of touch, I feel the pads of my fingers resting on the surface of water.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> If I listen just right, an oceanic swell comes into my hands: a surge of aliveness, a swell of emotion, of intelligence in the physiology.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> And I recognize this feeling is often followed very closely with a reaction of containing and clamping down on the swell. I realized how disruptive and dangerous those swells seem to be, and how often spontaneous authentic expression of aliveness is dampened or censored in order to remain within our referential social bounds.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> So much is censored—the good, the bad, the simply unexpected—in society to protect a feeling of safety and cohesion among groups.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> Or simply out of convenience (not time for sharing, getting into it, or falling apart) or shame.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> I feel how physiological this censorship is, and feel the amount of energy that it takes to contain our responses to this experience of being alive, and the backlog of swells unexpressed.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> The body, this person, is integrating experience and physiological response moment to moment to moment, with varying levels of success depending on their environment, predisposition, resources available, and held trauma. And I am offering an invitation for that integration to occur in whatever way it needs to happen, with the promise that their process does not scare me and does not need to be explained to me. Reality will not liquify as they liquify.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> They do not need to hold the world together, thus holding themselves back from going soft to update their system. I am here to surf the wave, to hold them while they lower their guard and be witness to any expression or transformation that may take place.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span> To reify them as they leave their post of responsibilities and to be present as they come back.</span></p>
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<p class="p2"><span class="s1"><a href="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342076?profile=original" target="_self"><img width="200" src="http://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/74342076?profile=RESIZE_320x320" width="200" class="align-left"/></a></span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">In improvisation, I am there to ride the wave of the swell that happens in the room, in the collective by allowing it to move my body. To offer myself and my perceptions as liquifying, to give an example of trusting the laws of nature so that I can soften into a fully responsive sensory being. And to respond to the nuance that is happening in the room: to bring into view a fraction of the infinite unseeable.</span></p>
<p class="p1"></p>PERCEPTIONS // Used Tea bagtag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-02-01:5831649:BlogPost:750132018-02-01T22:00:00.000ZIrena Romendikhttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/IrenaRomendik
<p><span>That little used tea bag hanging..., a product of consumer capitalism..., has traveled more then i did..., it's a herbal tea consisting of 7 medicinal and culinary herbs... -- Shakespeare's Ofelia: language of flowers speaking to the deaf...</span></p>
<p><span>That little used tea bag hanging..., a product of consumer capitalism..., has traveled more then i did..., it's a herbal tea consisting of 7 medicinal and culinary herbs... -- Shakespeare's Ofelia: language of flowers speaking to the deaf...</span></p>PERCEPTIONS // The comparison between a work from the 1960s by Imi Knoebel and one from the 2010s by Nasar Turtag:conectom.leimay.org,2018-02-01:5831649:BlogPost:750122018-02-01T22:00:00.000ZIrena Romendikhttp://conectom.leimay.org/profile/IrenaRomendik
<p><a href="http://www.blainsouthern.com/news/2013/nasan-tur-to-exhibit-berlin-says" shape="rect">http://www.blainsouthern.com/news/2013/nasan-tur-to-exhibit-berlin-says</a></p>
<p><a href="http://whitecube.com/exhibitions/imi_knoebel_inside_the_white_cube_bermondsey_2015/" shape="rect">http://whitecube.com/exhibitions/imi_knoebel_inside_the_white_cube_bermo...…</a></p>
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<p><a shape="rect" href="http://www.blainsouthern.com/news/2013/nasan-tur-to-exhibit-berlin-says">http://www.blainsouthern.com/news/2013/nasan-tur-to-exhibit-berlin-says</a></p>
<p><a shape="rect" href="http://whitecube.com/exhibitions/imi_knoebel_inside_the_white_cube_bermondsey_2015/">http://whitecube.com/exhibitions/imi_knoebel_inside_the_white_cube_bermo...</a></p>
<p><a shape="rect" href="https://5uur.wordpress.com/2014/07/20/hamburger-bahnhof-wall-works/">https://5uur.wordpress.com/2014/07/20/hamburger-bahnhof-wall-works/</a></p>
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<p><span>Both works scream at me the culture of excess and ignorance to nature, both are colorblind and desensitized: using the loudest available medium at hand, progressing from quieter scream of the 60's to over the edge scream of 2013 -- did 60's ruined our aural receptors to the level that requires even larger waves to penetrate insensibility? Color is both particle and a wave and can be easily translated into sound, and if I treat both these artworks as a musical notation, it maps to corresponding technologies of their time -- tape and mp3. Both artists don't give a shit about nature of color itself, especially wall painter -- such a waste of materials from my painter's point of view. 60's artwork still tries to fit into a shape, aiming to be avant-guardish, and second one confirms to 'oversized me', and tries to sell the video, because it's kind of hard to sell the wall itself, if you are not Michelangelo...</span></p>