My latest full-length show, WOW+FLUTTER finished a sold-out run at the incomparably fantastic LIC venue The Chocolate Factory Theater in February. I’ve been compiling the documentation and will be continually posting and updating things here. In the mean time, Claudia La Rocco wrote a review of WOW+FLUTTER in the New York Times. Here it is:
photo: Robert Caplin for The New York Times
The distinctive shaftway connecting the two levels of the Chocolate Factory in Queens is the theatrical gift that keeps on giving. It’s only a matter of time until some enterprising artist eschews this Long Island City theater’s larger stages and makes an entire show in the confines of that brick-lined space.
Last Friday night, Andrew Schneider climbed, slid and threw himself out of (and sometimes down) the passageway during his new evening-length solo, “Wow + Flutter.” He was all over the place — literally and metaphorically — using a harness, interactive projections and custom-built, wearable electronics. Gadgets, almost nonstop babble on themes both esoteric and mundane, numerous pop-culture images and even a brief Michael Jackson dance created a sort of technological id, governed by, to take Mr. Schneider’s words slightly out of context, his “internal head speed.”
The Wooster Group‘s North Atlantic is running this weekend and next at the REDCAT in downtown Los Angeles. It’s a great show, and I was lucky enough to get to rehearse as “Lud” for the month that we were in rehearsals at the Garage in SoHo, while Scott Shepherd was in a run of Gatz in Cambridge with ERS. I was able to get out there this weekend to shoot the show for our archive, and was really finally able to experience the show for the first time as a pseudo-audience member. The show is mind-blowing. A reminder not only of why I’ve always wanted to work with this company, but why I became involved in theatre in the first place. Really visceral, inspiring stuff. Go see it.
When everything, all information is all accessible, and all at the same time and all simultaneously; order, ordinance does not matter. Linear time as we know it is indifferent. Things poke holes in the present moment from other places. The whole of everything is now in one frame. Everything at once. All the time. Flattened out. With a meat tenderizer.
In an effort to organize my life in the two and a half days before the New Year and in preparation for some new New Year’s Resolutions. I’ve been doing a little winter cleaning on my laptop. I’ve been out of the country a lot recently and files for work and pleasure have been accumulating and commingling like I don’t know what. Time to purge. Because I’ve been out of the country I also purchased a Skype number to make it easier to conduct business on the cheap when abroad. When you purchase a Skype number you get to pick any number that is currently available (area code included) and subscribe to it for as long as you see fit. I’ve subscribed to my number for three months. When I’m done with it, it’ll be released back into the pool of available numbers. I imagine many people like me subscribe to a number for a very short period of time, and then give it up. Perhaps because of this high number-turnover-rate, some people pick up and drop numbers without notifying those that they’ve been in contact with that their number is no longer their number. Therefore, it’s inevitable that my number and I are getting phone calls for people whom I am not. When I’m not online to answer, they leave voicemails. Here are a sampling of misdirected voicemails that will never get to their intended recipient. Marcel, Tom, I am sorry.
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
It wasn’t but a few hours after I originally published this post that I got two more voicemails.
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
And hey. Why not go ahead and leave your own misdirected voicemail. Get some things off your chest before the new year!(917) 720-3227
They just keep coming.
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Last week I was fortunate enough to be able to get out of the city and up to the artsy air of Adams, Massachusetts. The curators at Greylock Arts gallery asked me to give a performance as part of their artist salon and in conjunction with their previous exhibit, Wearable Expressions – “a group exhibition of wearable art, accessories, and technology apparel exploring fashion as a means for individuals to dynamically express themselves.” I had a great time performing and the local audience was absolutely amazing. I wish I had audiences like this in Brooklyn. Maybe my demographic has shifted to the over 50 set. An edit from the gallery is below.
You get 5 minutes to talk about whatever you want in front of a large audience. You get to use twenty slides. Each slide auto-advances after fifteen seconds.
Back in September of 2008 I was able to convince someone that it was a good idea to let me do an Ignite talk. Actually, no, I think Tikva Morowati convinced me that it was a good idea. In any case, I decided to use the unique format to talk about Experimental Devices for Performance. The video is now here!
The end of 2008 has passed. Rather than mourn the loss of a sublimely mediocre year, I’m choosing to look forward, project into the future, and set myself up for what will undoubtedly be a just ever-so-slightly better 2009. Happy New Year!
Thanks to Andy Jordan at The Wall Street Journal for doing this nice piece about some of my technologically augmented performance stuff.
A big thanks to everyone who helped make this happen including Kate Hartman (pictured in the poster-frame image), The Wooster Group for use of their space, and Andy Jordan of The Wall Street Journal.
I totally lied and did not come through with posting CHN01′s progress. We all know how it goes. Too busy making the thing to remember to remember how we’re making it. Anyway, now’s your chance to come see what I’ve not been releasing early and often. I’ve got a performance coming up tonight! Here’s some excerpts (from rehearsal) on video! You should(‘ve) come! I was part of the “interactive art” night so there were tons of great performances lined up throughout the night.
I showed a work-in-progess piece called “CHN01″ which is more or less “PLEASEURE” again. I used a bunch of the EDP set.
Artist Michael Arthur was at the festival all weekend and made some beautiful drawings of some of the artists. I’m honored that he was able to sketch some of CHN01.
