September 11, 2007 Archives

I discovered William Kentridge early last year, when I picked up a book in the art book sale bin at Powell’s. Since then, he’s influenced me to get back into making animation and inspired me to tell a fellow MFA student to see his work. I have to say the Whitsell Auditorium is one of my favorite venues to see films. I thought to myself it’s a beautiful Sunday evening and only a few people will be there––no way, it was just about a full house.
I like to sit close so I can fill my visual field to the extent that it feels as if I’m watching the film in my head, like it’s a dream. I got a nice seat in the second row and right before the films started, somebody sat down in front of me obstructing the bottom right corner of the screen. His drawings, which filled up the screen, felt like if you touched the screen you would smear his drawing materials. When I thought I should be able to smell his studio, and the art materials on the screen, all I could smell was the perfume from someone behind me. What a draftsman Kentridge is! Here is an artist who knows how to draw perspective, anatomy, and animate in lush black drawings with only the most minimal color. Adding, erasing and making marks from the pages of his drawings as the camera moves along pulling the audience along for the ride over the giant paper. Rarely, there was the addition of blue to emphasize water with its symbolic meaning from our dreams, filling up here, there, everywhere, everything drowning––sex, money, capitalism, and death all intertwined. Water. There is something intriguing about water as a chaotic element. His drawings remind me of other artists in their subject matter and visual graphic look––Kathe Kollwitz, Sue Coe, William Groper, and another current South African artist, Marlene Dumas who coincidently works with similar themes and palette. Although Kentridge’s films were very political and took root from growing up in an apartheid and post-apartheid country, for most of us sitting in the theater so many different metaphorical interpretations can be explored in present day life in the U.S. Kentridge has that rare gift to be able to create beautiful drawings and tell a story (I love how he has created the character of Soho Eckstein in all his films). With the nostalgic look of old black and white films styles of the 1920’s combined with the music––I never wanted the film to end. The overlooked art of drawing beautifully is something you don’t want to miss. The timing is right to show these films now, and if you missed out seeing them Sunday, catch them Thursday, September 13th. We’re lucky we get to see more of Kentridge when his traveling show comes soon to Lewis & Clark College this fall.

Posted by Ben Killen Rosenberg

I love Taylor Mac. Portland loves Taylor Mac. Or at least the 200 people I saw him with did, and the hundreds more I saw him with last year. What is it we love so much? When I asked my dad, as delicately as possible, why Priscilla Queen of the Desert made him cry so much every time he watched it, he responded, “There’s just nothing that makes me feel so much as a tragically aging drag queen.” Taylor Mac isn’t tragic, nor aging, as far as I can see. No way—he’s bold and wonderful and vibrant and alive. And yet his songs are sad, a bit “slit my wrists” as an old dandy apparently told him. They are about missed connections, failures of love, of identity, and the funny, tragic little lives we all lead.

I think the thing that struck me most at this year’s show was the absolute outpouring of love toward Taylor at the end of the show. Is it because he’s such a good figure for us (whatever the collective us may mean)? A little beaten down, really sad about the stark isolation of this life, and yet bowled over also by the delicate beauty and the absurdity of it. Still trying, always trying, and furthermore, being fabulous while doing it. That, I think, is what I hear from Taylor Mac—be a little more gorgeous, a little more wild. “Nothing’s worth doing unless it makes you nervous,” that same dandy said, and Taylor Mac encourages taking risks. Until we dip a little into mylar (which some of the audience got to do), we’ll never be safe from “dwindling down into homogeneity,” he insisted.

Taylor Mac reminds me of something that’s bounced around in my head for a long time, from Nelson Mandela’s inaugural: “Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. . . . We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and famous?' Actually, who are you not to be? . . . We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. . . And when we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.” And Taylor Mac liberates us, little by little, with a bit of Mylar and an explosion of glittering synthetic fabrics.

But why, Taylor, why did you do the same show we got from you last year? With the addition of “find the mylar” I remember all this quite clearly from that show at The Works. It’s wonderful stuff—that’s why it stuck, but I wanted more, something new, a little further jaunt along your strange highway. That was my only complaint, except for the venue. Sure it’s ironic to have a drag show (or what have you) in a Christian Science Church, but I miss the nighttime world that Taylor Mac seems to belong to. Is he looking to be heard with more seriousness, as his remarks about “Catty Cathies” imply? Or is this just a scheduling issue? I have no qualms about calling Taylor Mac high art, but he’s the type of high art I like to experience in the dark with a drink in hand. Still, as he said, “We’re muddling through.”

The wise, above-mentioned dandy inspired Taylor Mac because he “believed wholeheartedly in beauty and not at all in perfection,” and that, I think, is the moral of this show. Taylor Mac shows us his own striking and curious beauty, which he maintains in the face of real and humorously imagined tragedy, and inspires in us our own. He affects us. After quipping that we were a diverse audience with “so many different kinds of white people,” he said “I’m not trying to bite the hand that feeds me, just wanting to get a little lipstick on it.” And so he did. From what I could see, we all left a little smeary, a little sad, a little less perfect, and a little brighter and more beautiful.

Posted by: Taya Noland

There is a dilemma at the core of The BE(A)ST of Taylor Mac that any self-aware snob has had to contend with before: what to do when the subculture moves to the mainstream, or rather, when an act from the subculture strives for the mainstream? The later seems the more damning of the two as one may forgive an artist for the mythical ‘accidental discovery’ but to set out with the intention of appealing to a mass audience? How dare he?

posted by Amber Bell

Although I had to work early the next morning, I did not want to miss going to The Works Monday night. I was looking forward to Anna Oxygen's latest all natural psychedelic concoction. Even more, I was enthusiastically anticipating work by Miwa Matreyek, who, I heard, used animation in an incredibly elaborate interactive way the likes of which has not been seen before.
Indeed, the collection of performances I watched last night were spectacular; comprised of not-necessarily-equal parts space-out, outer space, precision, incision, and jazzercize. Live people meet computer doubles meet shadow selves in various versions of a dream world.
Intriguing to me were the intersections of ideas, styles, and aesthetics. Having seen much of Anna Oxygen's previous work, it was interesting to note familiar elements and themes. I also noticed new amped-up technologies and meticulous technicalities. In Matreyek's solo performance, Anna Oxygen's musical composition contributed a dynamic dimension, and although I have not seen Chi-wang Yang's individual work, I can only imagine that his layers of visual and organizational care run deep. It seems clear to me that the Cloud Eye Control collaboration is a beneficial artistic booster all around.
Unfortunately, the technology ran aground prior to the final performance of the evening, and restlessly I waited as they toyed with computers, counting the minutes until I had to return the flexcar and get to sleep. I stayed until the last possible second. Onstage dreams were bottled, squads of advisors were multiplied and planets were overtaken with aerobic force. Heeding the wisdom of the performance, I went home to catch my dreams.

I came home Saturday afternoon from the On Sight opening to find a postcard filed in between the bills and magazines in our mail slot. Thumbing through the stack, I almost passed it over as an ad for a dental office or realtor before recognizing the image. The I-405 overpasses looked familiar, but the yellow Penske trucks grounded the image immediately in the industrial edge of the Pearl. In the lower corner, a young man crosses into the frame - presumably Paulsen. To a Portlander, the image initiates a game, a photographic "Where's Waldo?" of the local landscape. I turned the card over and confirmed my suspicions about its sender. And there, below his name and mailing address, I saw the quiet statement : "I'm Searching Too".

It stands as such a simple, but enigmatic phrase. These words at once include the recipient in Paulsen's search, acknowledge the commonality of searching and leave the search open for continuation. Apparently, the recipient isn't who (or what) Paulsen is searching for, but by receiving his card, you are invited to be a companion-in-arms. My search was for the connections between this tiny bit of mail-art and his exhibit at PNCA, from which I had just gotten back.

Along with Anna Gray, Paulsen has created a room for the searcher, the sleuth, and the explorer. At the center of the room is a small toy boat, moored away from water in a mound of gravel. Just in front of it, a pencil-drawn map of the world spans two adjoining walls. The trade routes and ocean currents are replaced with scrolling script recounting failed explorations and early navigators. Up until this point, Gray and Paulsen's work seemed to romanticize the adventure and allure of seafaring exploration, but upon turning around, I make the connection that I believe Paulsen intended for. Paulsen embraces all of the iterations of a search - the literal explorations, the euphemistic meanings, the puns. And there I am facing a wall-sized word-search.

I took a printed-out copy of the word-search from the exhibit and now at home with Paulsen's card, I have begun to seek out the words and search for the relationships and histories behind them. The list of phrases range the entire spectrum of the searchable. Words include objects (comfortable shoes), the paranormal (UFOs, Atlantis, Loch Ness), qualities (satisfaction), jokes (Waldo), and lost adventurers (Earhart, Slocum). Amongst the names of those lost-at-sea, Paulsen makes the tellingly sly choice of including Bas Jan Ader, a Dutch conceptual artist who disappeared from his boat in the midst of a solo performance piece entitled, "In Search of the Miraculous." A wry nod to history and influences sure, but also a slightly dark aside about the nature of performance.

Looking at Paulsen's list of words, all of the varied meanings that we assign to the word "search" begin to overlap. Is it an internal search for a quality or is it a matter of finding a misplaced or hidden item? Can these two types of searches ever be fully separated? What happens to the explorer who devotes a lifetime to looking for that which can't be found? What of those who are lost in their own searches, only to become themselves objects of a search? At the root of his project, it seems that Paulsen is searching for what it is that he should be searching for, compiling an encyclopedic array of searches. In the process, he makes it clear that we have a very hard time being content with what we know and have. Searching, whether for a place, an object, an individual, or a concept seems to be one of those elemental qualities of the human mentality.

I wonder if anyone who traveled from out of town for TBA will return home to a card, and if so, how they will read it? Perhaps it will seem like a postcard not from Portland, but from the festival - an elusive and temporary space, a Shangri-La. It will likely be a bit of a search just to remember where the card came from.

posted by patrick l.

Feeling sorry for who?

Note: If you haven't seen the piece yet, you might wait reading this post until after you saw it as I reveal some parts of the piece that are essential to the experience this wonderful play might offer you...

I was looking forward to seeing Kommer by Kassys for a really long time. I had the world premiere in my hometown (Ghent, Belgium) more than four years ago. I missed it back then and eversince there must be a curse on me making it impossible for me to see that show. After having seen their latest piece 'Liga' which I totally adored, I just had to see Kommer too. A reason by its self to buy myself a roundtrip airfare to the US. Still, it almost went wrong again. This time in Portland it was Taylor Mac's -too- long applause that gave me a really hard time getting at Lincoln Hall in time... Luckily -15 minutes late- they still let me it.

During the first fifty minutes of the piece we see a stripped down scene of mourning, sad people set in a minimal -equally sad- artificial stage design of brownish plantboxes full of dead plants. Nothing significant happens. They condole eachother, they try to comfort eachother, but all in the most unpersonal way you can imagine: "I can feel what you feel" or "I would love to help you but I think I can't"... The whole scene breathes distance, indifference, discomfort, but pushes it into extremity, making these sad happenings highly amusing. After a while all empathy with the 'mourning' performers has made place for malicious pleasure in the misfortune of the people on stage. "Why feeling sorry? They're just actors, making fun of themselves in a lovely show!"

This seems more than true when the performers leave the stage and a 'live' video starts on which we can see the performers backstage having fun and getting ready to go home again. But as fast as we thought Kassys confirmed our feelings about the 'play', the group smacks it right back in your face. The extreme sadness of the initial play -"Something horrible has happened!"- makes place for the more subtle, daily 'tristesse' of many people's lives that turns out to be much harder to bear than many of the worst events that could happen to you. In reality TV style, this video follows the sad and lonely lives of the actors, their lives when not on stage. The theatre turns silent again. When the video ends, the performance is finished as well. People go home, looking around, seeing the homeless, the single mothers, the detached... of Portland, thinking about these people's 'horrible' lives, feeling sad...

For a moment even I got caught in this misleading hyperemotional, empathic mood. But I know Kassys, and I know they are not at all emocore-theatre-makers. No, they are a witty bunch of conceptualists fooling you by toying around with the parameters of theatre and performance. There's no doubt that the misery shown in that 'reality movie' about actors' lives was just as fake as the misery in the funny, ironic theatre piece that preceded it. It's all part of one big 'show'. By juxtaposing two ways of presenting fake sadness, it shows us how theatre is able to fool with our feelings of empathy.

As in their latest piece 'Liga' (phonetically meaning 'to lie' in dutch), 'Kommer' is all about the theatrical lie and how we let ourselves fool not only by movies, theatre, but just as well by reality TV and even what we assume to be real such as spectacular newspaper pictures of the Iraq war that are in fact just locals organizing photoshoots for the international media... It's true that -as Baudrillard puts it- that we can no longer distinct the real from the unreal. By making many people believe something is real, it maybe also becomes real... And this, my dear fellow readers, might be the magic of theater... and our disturbed minds...

by Wouter Bouchez

Wowza, The Works has been fun this year. Between the PICA beer garden outside and the late night Wonder Cafe menu, I've logged a lot of hours and had a ball. If you're new to TBA, this is the venue to get a feel for the festival, meet artists, and take in the world of PICA. If you're a TBA veteran, you know The Works as the place to decompress, discuss the shows of the day, and finish the night off right. Tonight is yet another great chance to get a drink and settle in for the sounds of the Portland Cello Project with a hot lineup of guest local musicians. If you're looking for the right TBA event to take a date to, I highly suggest this one. If you're feeling a little tuckered out, there's nothing like some cellos and indie folk rock to give you sweet dreams and revitalize you for tomorrow.

I didn't realize how many awesome artists will be a part of tonight's performance until I looked at the Portland Cello Project's own website. Here's what they have to say about tonight:
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"Sept 11, the Portland Cello Project will be putting on it’s largest cello extravaganza yet! We will have a full contingent of 12 and sometimes 13 cellists on stage, and the program will be more diverse than ever at Portland’s beautiful Wonder Ballroom. 128 NE Russell, Portland, OR 97212. Call 503.284.8686 for more info.

On the program:
Justin Kagan will be performing the first and second movements of the Elgar Concerto for Cello and Orchestra (Arranged for 12 cellos and soloist).

We will feature new or re-worked collaborations with Bright Red Paper, Nick Jaina, Heather Broderick, Laura Gibson, John Weinland and Musee Mecanique.
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Ok, wow. That's a ton of rad Portland musicians and 13 cellists for the price of one event.

Bright Red Paper has been cello rockin' for years and has a new singer who put on a great show at PDX Pop Now. Nick Jaina's silky voice is backed by a band that seems to grow with every show. Heather Broderick is in local fav's Horse Feathers and Loch Lomond (also on Hush Records). John Weinland is twangy and sweet and also made up of very nice people. I once drank some top quality absinthe with several fun members ofMusee Mecanique, and that's all I know about that.

Laura Gibson is a nationally acclaimed songstress and one of the nicest people in town. I'm always psyched to see her in person and in concert. She's been featured on NPR's All Songs Considered, played SXSW this year, and has an album that makes the coming winter seem bearable and even romantic. Actually, I would say that all of the above bands produce music perfect to get you through the rainy months with just the right amount of introspection and warmth.

Check out some of their albums (no Cello Project, sadly) on local label Hush Records, which is also run by an incredibly nice local person and was the first label of the Decemberists (some of their first LPs are available there, on sale!). The Hush Site is having a ridiculous summer sale , with albums by or including many of the people referenced above plus downloads of free studio sessions, and this You Tube performance by Laura and the Cello Project:

Check out more Portland Cello Project music at their myspace site.

--Carissa Wodehouse
Blogger, member, enthusiast

Greening TB:A
-Posted by Patrick Alan Coleman

The world’s culture has become obsessed with its demise. According to Reggie Watts wonderfully absurdist prophesy, Disinformation, that demise will come in 2012, when the Mayan calendar ends. More likely it we be a long, drawn out, uncomfortable process. According to Leonardo Di Caprio and Al Gore, it will be ecological disaster stemming from fossil fuel use and the subsequent carbon emissions.

Based on our personal energy use, we all have a “carbon footprint,” the amount of carbon emissions we are responsible for pumping into the atmosphere. Businesses and events generally have significant carbon footprints.

The TB:A festival’s carbon footprint must be remarkable. Consider the artists that are shuttled around the globe, harried participants driving from venue to venue and the amount of energy it takes to light galleries and stages. Luckily, many participants choose public transportation or bicycles to get from place to place. Still it’s likely that the festival is responsible for an additional carbon load over its 11 day run.

There is something that festival participants can do. An increasing number of organizations are selling Verified Emission Reduction credits (VER’s). When VER’s are purchase the money is invested in companies and non-profits that are working to reduce carbon emissions through methods as diverse as planting trees and burning harmful methane gas from landfills.

Anyone interested in offsetting the carbon emissions of festival participation can find a list of organizations selling VER’s at ecobusinesslinks.com. Just think of the piece of mind you’ll have watching the Portland Cello Project, knowing that the emissions produced from your drive to the Works has been offset by the planting of a few new trees.

Anna Oxygen Works it Out
-posted by Patrick Alan Coleman

I like the Works space this year, even though it does lack some of that high-end, DIY charm, which has been the hallmark of its previous incarnations. What works at the Works, located in (or is that inhabiting?) the Wonder Ballroom, is the visibility and capacity, optimized by a stage that can easily support larger acts. But what the Works has yet to conquer is the separation of those who Taylor Mac refers to as “Catty Chatties,” and those who are genuinely interested in watching what’s happening on stage.

But last night, Anna Oxygen’s high contrast, ultra-dimensional, projection pieces, managed to lull the decompressing Works crowd into wide-eyed submission. At least while she was on stage.

Pray for the Sasquatch Band. The fuzzy-headed, old-timey pungent of Sasquatch (pungent being the term for a group of Sasquatch, as in: I saw a pungent of Sasquatch traipse through the clearing), meant to keep everyone engaged between Oxygen’s pieces, was roundly ignored by the audience- with the exception of one fellow who stood in front of them, slapping his knee and playing tambourine without any discernable rhythm whatsoever. I guess if you’re a Sasquatch, being unacknowledged is all part of the game. After all, they are incredibly difficult to spot in the woods. But I had no idea Sasquatches are nearly impossible to hear when they play music in a club. Stealthy.

Each time the lights dimmed, the large Works crowd, who apparently did not believe in Sasquatches, would quiet down for another visual gem from Oxygen.
The first two pieces of Oxygen’s show were completely entrancing. Her projections created an intense, forced perspective placing Anna Oxygen in mountain vistas, cold planets, impossible computers, and glimmering cities. Like a monochromatic Michael Gondry video come to life. Comparable to Charlotte Vanden Eynde and Kurt Vandendriessche’s, Map Me, Oxygen’s work creates an illusory sense of depth and motion on flat and static backgrounds. The amount of timing and choreography to pull these visions off must be astounding. In a way, her work is as much magic show as it is performance. The line is particular difficult to draw here because the central visual conceit, borders on gimmick.

The problem is that Oxygen’s work is a bit uneven. Yes, the visual artistry is superb, but it is not matched by lyrics and music that sound a bit juvenile. It’s as if Oxygen’s script is reaching for the profound but can’t escape juvenilia. “Am I in your dream? Or are you in mine?” This question, asked in the third of Oxygen’s performances, Final Space, has been asked a million times. If only it had been asked differently this time. Make no mistake that Anna Oxygen has a lovely voice, it’s just that her songs sound like something that might have been written by Nina Hagen or Lori Andersen in their pre-teens.

During the performance, and the interludes by the invisible Sasquatch band, I found myself wondering what would happen if Anna Oxygen were given a full theater, with fly loft and stage crew to create a seamless show from beginning to end. I suspect that an audience might be too mesmerized by the spectacle to notice the lyrics of Oxygen’s songs.

It was interesting, in a kind of deconstructionist (constructionist?) way, to watch Anna Oxygen’s crew set up for the next piece, aligning the projectors and setting the stage. But I would have had a much better time, had the show been seamless. It’s possible that the Works is simply not appropriate for Oxygen's show. Either way, I’d like to see Anna Oxygen perform again a year or two from now, in a theater that will allow her to find rhythm. I suspect with time her songs will be able to match the artistic prowess of her visual spectacle.

This year’s TBA began with quiet, with calm, with a gathering of Portlanders at Pioneer Square. It was peaceful. When I arrived, the square was filled, a low murmur rising from the young families and artists who were sitting, for the most part, on the ground or on the steps. Eventually, the singers came, holding a variety of books, and took their places. I was excited by it, by the promise of what might happen when people come together in the city to sing.

As a preface to everything else I have to say, I think I should repeat what I heard one man say later on about this performance: “It was really beautiful and everything, but I couldn’t hear a thing.” Unfortunately I think this was the experience most people had. Among the whistling, the rustling and the song that I could hear there was significant dead space. Too much was drowned out by the ambient sound. I tried to convince myself that the city soundscape was interwoven with the performance, that the Max, the interminable construction, the cars, were all a part of the migration. But honestly, they drowned out more than I wanted them too.

The performers, a motley Portland crew wearing bright scarves, occasional sunglasses, and carrying books in their hands, sang beautifully, whistled and murmured convincingly, and raised their arms in the air, their hands bobbing for all the world like the curious heads of a flock of birds.

As the singers looked up to the sky, shading their eyes, watching the imagined migration, I couldn’t help but look too. A few pigeons did their part to represent the actuality of flight, but otherwise the sky was still. Nonetheless, I found myself staring into it, noticing the largeness of the city, aware, as I rarely am, of the tops of the buildings, the clouds streaking the sky, the cranes reshaping the landscape. I felt a little silly. Every time the singers looked upwards, so did I, like a child believing each time that those excellent birds would appear. They did not, but I enjoyed that twenty minutes of seeing the topside of Portland, of staring up into the sky. What surprised me most was that almost no one else was staring up into the sky with me. They resisted the impulse to follow the eyes of the singers. I wonder how, and I also wonder why.

I’ve noticed in the first few days of this year’s TBA that we are a very mannerly group here in Portland. The lyrics that were sung were included in the programs for “Great Migration,” with a note that they might be of use. It took me a moment to figure out what this meant and then, just as I was straining to hear, and thinking it would be nice if the singers were spread around the square, I realized that it was an oblique invitation to join in. I wanted to, or rather I wanted us, the collective audience, to be moved spontaneously to song. A woman behind me did begin singing along in a low voice. I considered it but decided against it, as did most of the audience if it had occurred to them at all. Perhaps it was the intrusion of the city noises, and the dead space they created, but the performance felt as though it just didn’t become what it could.

Nonetheless, it was beautiful and quirky and fun. I have not yet lost the image of the singers all raising their arms like the long necks of cranes. As the singers filed out after the performance I glanced at the titles of the books they had chosen. The first few books were bird related: Refuge, Wild Ducks Flying Backwards, but then Jane Eyre. I have to admit that I’m an English teacher, and I was intrigued by those book choices. Perhaps it was the preponderance of Tom Robbins, but I was reminded, on my way out, of those peyote-eating cranes in Even Cowgirls Get the Blues. The sheen of the pink and green and blue scarves the performers wore, and the tattooed forearms morphing into an excellent flock in the square: a good image for Portland, and for TBA.

Posted by: Taya Noland

According to the TBA book, a number of TBAers should have received / will receive postcards as part of Ryan WIlson Paulsen's project "I'm Searching Too." I've been giddily checking my mailbox each week, but nothing has turned up. Has anyone out there been a lucky winner? Do tell...

--Carissa Wodehouse
Blogger, member, enthusiast (and lover of mail! Hint!)

T:BA:07 Day Five – Monday, 10 September 2007

I love yoga. Have I mentioned that? I LOVE YOGA!!!
I started about a year ago. I was dating this woman that I met at Burningman, whom is a yoga teacher, and when I went to visit her the first time in San Francisco, I took my first yoga class. Well, since then, she came out of the closet, started a wonderful relationship with a woman, and we, needless to say, broke-up. But, I have continued with my yoga practice. And I love it!
Much like T:BA, I believe that all things in your life are there for a reason. They are opportunities to learn and grow. Nature Theatre of Oklahoma is one of those things for me. I hated them last year with a passion, and cringle this year a bit when I start seeing folks wearing their t-shirts; but I am looking forward to their workshop later in the week, so that I may learn.
Today, assuming that I finish this bLog speedily, take a shower, and get my butt downtown in time, I will be taking a workshop with a theatre group that I enjoyed last night, but did not impress me too much. But, in that, I might learn something…

Last night, I wanted to bLog before going to sleep.
It has a wonderful reflective and tidy sense to wrap up the day in word, and then lull off to dreams. But, as I was sitting in the Wonder Ballroom talking with some friends about their playa experience this year, and whether they feel that the Burn is ‘done’ or not; I realize, yep… I need to get some sleep. Sorry, getting up for my 7am yoga class trumped this bLog. That’s just the way it is.

OK, so what happened yesterday?
What inspired me? What was I thinking? What did I have as a snack? [Well, you probably do not care about my gastronomical adventures, but that’s all part of the journey…]

Oh, sorry, gotta get up and give the pup her morning milkbone. Oh, and now that I finished the bowl of cottage cheese, I need to have my bowl of pumpkin flax seed granola.

Btw, perhaps you have been wondering about this pup that I have mentioned time and again. Shelby is a 6yo Siberian Husky, and she ROCKS! If you have seen the red Siberian roaming around the Wonder Ballroom, Shelby is much like that, but BETTER! [Hey, she’s my pup, so I’m biased.]

Yadda, yadda, yadda,… Fredrick, would you get on task already…

10:00a Urban Honking Workshop, Gerding Armory
12:30p Illusion & Anti-Illusion, PNCA
Arnold Kemp / Regina Silveira
3:00p Sara Greenberger Rafferty Salon, Corberry Press
Space is a Place / Larry Donovan / Sara Greenberger Rafferty Exhibit
4:00p Ina Diane Archer, PSU: Autzen
6:30p tEEth, PCPA: Winningstad
8:30p Kassys, PSU: Lincoln
10:30p Cloud Eye Control / Anna Oxygen

Yesterday started with a presentation by Urban Honking. They are the folks that are hosting this bLog site for PICA Well, the funny thing is that I was a touch late for the talk, as I was writing the bLog from the day before, and their website was having some serious bandwidth problems. That basically means, that it was as slow as molasses, and then crashing out. A technical term for, “Hey, guys, time to spend some more money and upgrade your software and connection speed!”. Well, this became a topic of our discussion. “The life of the web”…
These three housemates thought it would be fun to start up a bLog site, and have some of their friends write articles. Over time, it has grown and taken on its own life, which is both wonderful and sometime difficult as the parent of the organism.
This is something that happened with Tribe.net. About a year ago, they were purchased by Pepsi, and the site was ‘corrupted’ with advertising. Then they were PG-13 filtered, but not to the extend of MySpace. Now they are getting back on their legs, and the community feels strong again. The owners of that site, after selling Tribe started a site called Zaadz. They started the site with the intention of a sustainable community. They learned from Tribe, and wanted to find a sustainable commercial method, much like Patagonia and some other environmentally conscious companies. Sometimes it goes well, sometimes not. This is what is happening with Burningman these days. It is also what could happen with Urban Honking if they are not more sagacious parents. They say that they do not want to go commercial, but they also do not want to have to pay for extra bandwidth out of their own pockets. After all, this is just a hobby for them, it is not their day job. I really question this. If you do not really care, then don’t do it. It is quite a bit of what we were discussing with Sara Greenberger Rafferty the day before. Be an artist, or get out of Hell’s Kitchen!
Well, we will have to see what happens with Urban Honking.
My prediction is that they will find some other hobby in a few years, and this will be a random memory for them. But, we will have to see…

Next was a Noon:30 chat with Melia Donovan, Larry Bamburg, and Kristan Kennedy entitled “Illusion & Anti-Illusion”. There was some interesting discussion about Melia’s work, and the feminine perspective, connections to traditional handicraft around the home, and her photographic intentions. The funny thing, is that I, much like a number of others in the audience, went to see Melia’s work, and did not see it. It is subtle, and I am going to have to search it out a bit more carefully as the week goes on.
I was a bit more interested in what Larry and Kristan started to discuss, “The process of making”. Larry talked about his ‘asinine’ process, one that completely frustrated Jörg Jakoby of PICA, which is where the beauty comes from. When you have an idea, you need to get it out of your head fast and furious. The longer you ‘think’ about it, the more that you gestate, the more that societal preconceptions and mediocrity will intervene. Larry wants to get it out, pure, raw, honest. And he did just that. Sure, there is no way to archive his work. The tape will yellow in a few weeks and then peel off. The plastic t-bars will eventually sag and collapse under the weight and torque of the kinetic elements… But, for now, it is a beautiful installation.
So, I posed the question to Larry and Kristan about blurred lines, about sculpture v. performance art. I do not have an answer, and neither did the two of them; but I am quite interested in this. My work has been going in this direction, and I would love to have some ideas and feedback to make the work more provocative.
I have been doing some larger scale sculptural installation / environments.
In the forty-foot square and up variety.
They have been quite fun and people have been enjoying them.
One group commissioned me to create a piece for them in the Crystal Ballroom. They liked it so much, they then commissioned me a second time for another piece during a First Thursday. Well, I have been wanting to take the ‘process of making’ into the presentation, so that the works whether they be temporary or permanent have a knowledge that they can convey with the audience both passively and actively.
The commission became a way of me creating a sculptural piece, and then Mizu Desierto [an accomplished Butoh dancer] was nested within, and started to respond to the piece. I then responded to her movement, and sculpted the piece more. For kicks, Noah Mickens was brought into the mix to act as percussionist and ‘play’ the steel. The piece was amazing. It was nothing that I imagined, and completely took on its own organic life for the two hours that we performed in front of a couple hundred unexpecting people.
Kinematic Space: http://www.fhzal.com/works/060706
I also made a proposal to PICA for last year’s T:BA for a progressive installation.
They piece was going to evolve over the course of all ten days, by each morning having a two-hour aerial installation performance in the atrium of Wieden + Kennedy.
Unfortunately, the piece required a minimum budget of $15,000; so it was scrapped, but I would still like to see something of the sort happen.
1,000 Vectors | 10 days: http://www.fhzal.com/works/060330
The big question, is how [from a curatorial / audience / patron standpoint] may it stay interesting.
I love Larry’s piece, but watching him tie monofilament for twenty hours would be just a touch better then watching grass grow. That epiphany moment when he turned a high-tech cookie sheet into a non-skid fan belt cylinder, was certainly a better fireworks display inside of his head, then outside. But, I don’t know. I remember back in graduate school, people used to love watching me whirl around creating maquettes. So, I do believe that there might be a way to make the process really interesting.

Please do comment, give me some ideas, start a dialogue.
This is something that I would like to learn more about, and will probably expand this little paragraph into something longer for submission to a journal or magazine.

Moving right along…
Sara Greenberger Rafferty had her book release at the Corberry Press, which was a good way to try and get more folks over there, as this year the location is a bit out-of-the-way, and therefore not drawing the attendance that it deserves. Go check out the work in the space, and the light pieces by Hap Tivity next door at Liz Leach’s temporary warehouse.

I had heard Sara talk about her book the day before in her workshop, so I felt is was redundant; plus there was a cast and crew screening of a film about the fire circus that I was part of for a number of years. So, I headed over to the Clinton Street theatre for that instead.

Back home for a moment, another slice of lasagna [as I baked one and a banana cake to help facilitate healthy eating during this chaotic week before it began].

I had intention of seeing Ina Diane Archer’s work at PSU’s Autzen gallery, but I wanted to relax for a moment and spent some time with my pup, as she has not been getting the attention that she usually receives with me running around this a mad PICA patron.

TEEth had their premiere of “Normal and Happy” last night at PCPA’s Winningstad theatre. Besides the fact this is my favorite performance space in town, I have been looking forward to seeing another work by Angelle Herbert and Phillip Kraft [www.rubberteeth.com] for a while. The couple tends to create one piece a year, expending all of their energy and capital in the investment. You can feel that. There is nothing held back. They believe in that fully, and give of themselves to such an extent that they could end up in an asylum, ICU or poor house if the work is not accepted as they hope. But, don’t worry, it is GREAT!!! If they ever had financial concerns, I imagine [or atleast hope] that it will now be a thing of the past. I can only hope that patrons and underwriters see this work, recognize their mature talent, see the potential for decades of exploration, and write them a blank check for that future journey.
The work of Angelle Herbert and Phillip Kraft defies explanation. That is why it is so profound, though-provoking, fresh and inspirational for me. Taylor Mac abhors comparison, and I would agree here, as any comparison with water down the intensity and truth behind the work that is tEEth, or place them at odds with other amazingly talented artists.
But, since the show is sold-out, it might not be possible for everyone to take it in.
I can only hope that somehow, someone decides to let them perform a few more times, as three shows is just not enough for the entire world to see… But, in that, it is also brilliant. If the world wants to see their work, they are going to have to be commissioned for more work in other locations around the world!
[Hint, Hint, Hint… Baryshnikov Arts Center give them a call, and set them up for a residency!]

OK, so I’ll tell you a bit, but I also want people to camp out to try and get in, so I do not want to put in any spoilers…

Frame of reference:
If you grew-up seeing Mel Stuart's cinematic version of Ronald Dahl's "Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory" [1971], beheaded chicken in the tunnel and all, you are walking the right path. Tim Burton did a re-make in 2005, but Hollywood flinched. Tim could have beautifully delivered the vision of Dahl, but they were terrified that the public would not accept it, and they would not make back their money. This is a shame, and something that has plagued Burton’s career. Angelle Herbert and Phillip Kraft do not flinch. They do not pull-back, they do not hesitate, they do not back-down. Their work is completely uncompromising. Like Donna Uchizono, they challenge their dancers to move their bodies in manners that are completely bizarre, like Takashi Shimizu in his horrific films. Angelle Herbert and Phillip Kraft have become known for their use of facial expressions and Clockwork Orange-like voluntary body deformations of mouth and eyes.

Knowing a number of the dancers, it was quite strange trying to figure out whom they were on stage. The cast has been very secretive about the work, even under extreme pressure since the partial release at On the Boards in Seattle, when they received great acclaim. Angelle Herbert and Phillip Kraft have a way of making amazingly beautiful people incredible ugly, or should I say twisted. Watching two beautiful dancers within a kaleidoscope of movement, transform into gawking tongue smacking chicken hawks is quite intense. And I love it!

Toward the beginning of the piece is a duet by Jim McGinn and Alenka Loesh. I consider Jim to be one of Portland best dancers, and certainly one of the community members that Baryshnikov is concerned about getting drawn in Paris to leave a vacuum here where he once was. But, he deserves it. Jim dances four to six hours each and every day, uncompromisingly. He loves his art, and he does not waver. This is why he was a natural selection for Angelle Herbert and Phillip Kraft. Alenka Loesh has a world renowned presence, and we are lucky that she has been residing in Portland for the last few years. I had the delight of collaborating with her about a year ago on a piece called ePheMere with Mizu Desierto. Alenka’s strength come from the diversity of her background. She has explored her inner-gypsy and toured the world, dancing with any company that inspired her. ePheMere was primarily in the school of Butoh, and you can see it in tEEth. Alenka’s toes are as expressive, if not more, than most’s hands. There is a moment, when she is inverted, wrapping her prehensile toes around Jim’s face, with such expression that I was deeply moved. The piece continues with her climbing on him, as he continues to move and contort, as if she was a tree climbing kangaroo. I would love to see what she could do if we had not lost our tails as evolved homosapiens!

As I still do not want to spoil the show, I will stay a bit vague now. There are fifteen dancers in the performance. They each are magnificent in their own right, and even stronger as teams of one, one, two, two, four, and five.

[Ernest Adams, Renee Adams, Jessica Burton, Suniti Dernovsek, Gina Frabotta, Jonathan Krebs, Alenka Loesh, Carla Mann, Jim McGinn, Laura Nash, Estelle Olivares, Bonni Stover, Nicole Stettler with Malina Rodriguez, Paloma Soledad and Vanessa Vogel.]

There is one other part, that I ask you to watch, as I am trying to figure it out myself…
Angelle moved through the looking glass, stretching forth as ghostly apparition, transmutated form, and I just don’t know how! Lycra does not stretch that far, and I have looked for sheet of rubber for performances myself and could not find them anywhere in Portland… So, if you figure it out, please do let me know.

A few last things of interest, Paloma Soledad [costume designer] had been associated with Burton’s “Sleepy Hollow” film before leaving LA for Portland a couple of years back. She also worked with them on beNUMBed two years back, which is an amazing performance in and of itself at the IFCC.

Oh, and if you go on the last right, I hear they might be giving out jello shots. Come thirsty.

Well, I left feeling quite Happy after the tEEth performance.
I would have gone home, and dreamed or taken in a nice meal with friends quite contently.
Marc Bamuti Joseph, Reggie Watts, Donna Uchizono; it has been a great T:BA this year. But tEEth eclipsed them fully for me. I will continue my support and advocacy for them, as I truly and honestly LOVE their vision, execution, and innocence.
Never change Angelle Phillip!

The beauty and bane of going to all of T:BA, is something when having a moment of content bliss, you still have to jettison yourself over to the next venue for the next performance.

So, I did…

Next on the docket was Kassys. It is a play that started off with about twenty minutes of us as an audience just chatting away, no fully realizing that the play had begun. The work was about real life, or as much as real life may be portrayed in theatre about real life about theatre about real… ok, you get the point. There is a philosophical feed-back loop here.
The ‘play’ aspect of the play was not to very interesting to me. They were exploring the full extent of “awkwardness”, and they did it quite masterfully. But, the problem, for me, with plays is that they are 1) false, and 2) they depend so very heavily upon well-crafted prose. Not all play writes do a great job.
But, the second aspect of the play was when the ‘play’ was done, and they all went off to their ‘normal’ lives. It was witty, and I enjoyed how they explored actors needing to vent and cope with the emotional state they need to conjure for a performance.

I went over to the Wonder Ballroom feeling reasonably perky. It was, after all, only a seven event day, quite light compared to the day prior.

Cloud Eye Control / Anna Oxygen was performing.
It was a good show, and I enjoyed it.
But, the audience was just dumb-struck. Perhaps they were sleep deprived, as I know I was becoming, but it was not really THAT innovative!
For any of you that have been going to PICA’s performances for a while, you might remember Miranda July's “Swan Tool” back in 2000 at the Scottish Rites Center in Goose Hollow. THAT was innovative, fresh, new, unprecedented. AND, she had to invent that technology. Anna, sorry, but your art school piece was just another one of the cool things that come out of Cal Arts MFA programs. I liked it, and I look forward to seeing your next vision, but you are going to have to try harder to woo me.

Much love,
Fredrick H. Zal
Architect | Sculptor | Advocate

Atelier Z
an.architecture and industrial design studio
advocating dialogue in the fine + applied arts
http://www.fhzal.com

Normal and Happy is very difficult to sum up, not only because of the proliferation of characters and scenes, but also because of their general and basic morphability. These bodies in contact are wrestling, making love, becoming insect, struggling, dominating, submitting, melting. Faces become visages of anger fear, pain, shock, horror, rage, vacuity... A lack of identifiers allow the characters to become many things in quick succession, though over time, we begin to recognize certain threads of behavior. There’s the lumpy tribal slapstick quartet, the vinyl spartan insect duo, the vinyl s&m nurse machine soldiers, etc. These groups all seem poisoned by the compelling need to carry out a precise series of absurd actions. But it remains unclear if that demand is coming from an external source or rises from deeply shared internal forces. Or are they all simply mental projections coming from the kaleidoscopic cuddle twins?
Normal and Happy is organized by a series of overlapping vignettes, in which a character or group of characters appear, make some kind of physical statement in which conformity causes strange patterns, and then fade off stage. We are guided through this mirrored labyrinthian narrative by the powers of repulsion and attraction, which often mix and trade places. I am resisting the urge to describe (or rather attempt to describe) these scenes. Certain moments hit with the brutal intensity of a fever dream, as when the lovemaking couple becomes a soldier dragging a dead body.
But then there are so many other moments which swirl in a kind of distopian baseness. It’s like watching a cannibalizing praying mantis. The forces which compel the insect to eat its own kind are both totally foreign and deep at the heart of human experience. In the midst of these passing scenes of horror, there sits the kaleidoscope box, within which a certain peace reigns. But it seems likely that this box is only a space of screenal nostalgia, protected from the outside world by ignorance or naiveté.
Music is a powerful uniting force for Normal and Happy. From relentless jabbing piano, pounding blocks, digital noise, synchronized stomping and shouting emerges a haunting lullaby about the loss of personal identity. Many powerful moments are entirely low-tech, formed simply by pounding voices and bodies.
A few small comments of criticism. Occasionally, the use of extremely loud noise feels overdetermined, as the attempt to create an effect shears away from the actual volume level. I remember this also being a problem in their previous production, benumbed. It is possible to create sounds that are physically affecting without being painful. Another area of overdetermination was in the transitions between scenes. Often these seams are joined effectively by a shared gesture or movement, but sometimes the attempt to hide or diminish the exits of a group only made me want to watch them more. A more factual approach could be suitable.
tEEth are tackling big, ambitious, disturbing and courageous subjects with both elegance and brute force. I’m excited to see where they go next.
-posted by Seth Nehil

The protean Taylor Mac, fabulously clad in an ever-shifting array of clothes, sings and talks his way into our hearts. By turns hilarious and poignant, Taylor takes us through the politics of the war on terror, dating in the twenty-first century, various past performances, and how to struggle on despite fear and loneliness.

Taylor calls The BE(A)ST of Taylor Mac a play, while others (such as underwriters and promoters) call it a performance art piece—or drag, in Taylor’s language. Playing the ukulele or singing a cappella, Taylor performs with the crowd, always noting their reactions (“Oh, that sounded like an Oprah applause!”). He makes several well-placed jokes at Portland’s expense: a bit about a subway system in Abilene, KS gets laughs; in Portland, the audience seems to say, “Well, we could have one if we wanted to.” “I love a town with attitude,” he says.

Perhaps my favorite song was the one that repeated the line “but I love him.” It begins, “He had the smallest penis of anyone I have ever seen… but I love him.” Then, “He had the worst European teeth I have ever seen…” Soon the song turns uglier: “He shoved crystal meth up my ass while I was sleeping… He got drunk and vomited on me… He wanted to have unprotected sex and when I said no he asked if I had ‘afrAIDS’… but I love him.” The song ends movingly, as Taylor talks about himself and his faults, ending again with, “And I love him.”

Like a Utah Phillips in drag, Taylor Mac often talks during his songs, going on tangents, sometimes telling stories or adding news about recent performances. The set consists of his wardrobe, a stool, and luggage stroller. Light and sound cues were called out by Taylor from the stage. Still, these blemishes did not upset the show: after all, how often do you see a drag show in a Christian Science Church?

One bit involved asking men from the audience to find mylar, then having several men on stage dress in drag. Taylor showed these men how to go from looking awkward to looking fabulous, how to de-masculinize the revolution and do it diva-style. When looking at a baby, in full drag and sequins pasted on his face, he fawns, “You can be anything you want to be,” often alarming the parents. “I’m a part of the decline of Western civilization,” he says. If this is the decline, then I am ready to fall anywhere with Taylor Mac.

Posted by Dusty Hoesly