2022 October “born from, and returns to…
Dani Lunn
Dani Lunn, STARLIGHT BLOOM
2021 November “That people get together…”
Jay Carlon
WAKE (excerpt / work in progress) what if grief was my collaborator? how do i discern loneliness from solitude? have i ever truly been independent? these are the questions that fuel me right now. WAKE is an entry point to confront them.
Jay Carlon is an artist based in Los Angeles and NYC. His work is inspired by growing up the youngest of 12 in a Filipino, Catholic, and agricultural migrant-working family, and is committed to connecting his art practice to sustainability and his personal and collective journey of decolonization. Jay’s work has been presented in Los Angeles at REDCAT, The Broad Museum, L.A. Dance Project, Annenberg Community Beach House, Union Station, Los Angeles Performance Practice, homeLA; in New York at 92ndY and The CURRENT SESSIONS; in Phoenix at Breaking Ground Festival; in Monterrey, Mexico at Espacio Expectante; and in Bangkok, Thailand at Creative Migration. Jay is a performer and directing associate with aerial spectacle theatre company Australia’s Sway Pole, where he has performed at the 2014 Olympics, the 2016 World EXPO, and the 2018 Super Bowl. Carlon has also performed with the Metropolitan Opera at Lincoln Center, Palissimo, Oguri, No)one. Art House, Rodrigo y Gabriela, Solange Knowles, and choreographed works for Kanye West and Mndsgn.
Chenhui Mao
When “I” becomes “It” is a performance work created and performed by Mao. It is also bodily research towards body in mundanity, digital other and the subject of time.
Mao is a movement-based performance maker from China. Mao’s practice draws on improvisation, de-contextualization and daily mundanity to create performance works that explore the body’s response to constant and absurd flux. Her experiences include working with Sankai Juku, Dimitri Chamblas, Julie Bour, Rubberlegz, Oguri, Sam Wentz and many more in a wide range of performances across Japan, France, China and the United States. Currently an MFA pursuer at School of the Art Institute of Chicago, she hopes to continue testing the sense of boundary, practicing “un-do,” creating works with a gentle sense of humor.
Carmina Escobar
UNFURLING IRIS: A ritual for the flower feather and its eternal cosmic movement.
Carmina Escobar is an extreme vocalist, improviser, sound and intermedia artist from Mexico City currently based in LA. Escobar investigates and expresses emotions, politics, state of alienation, and the possibilities of interpersonal connection through voice performances, installations, and video pieces that seeks to challenge our understandings of musicality, gender, queerness, race, the spoken word, and the foundations of human communication. She has presented her work in Mexico, Cuba, Europe, USA, and Canada in festivals and venues such as PST:LA/LA, Fabrica de Arte (HVN), CTM Festival (BRL), RedCat, The Broad, The Kitchen, among many others. Escobar has been an artist in residence in Montalvo, STEIM, Binaural Portugal, OMI, Electroacoustic Music Studio in Krakow, Fonoteca NacionalMX, Indexical, The MacDowell Residency, and in late September of this year at the BEMIS Center in Nebraska. Carmina has received three Endowment of The Arts in Mexico, the USArtist International Award with the project Estamos Ensemble, Master Scholarship of NALAC, the 2020 FCA Artist award in Music/Sound, and the NPN 2020 Creation Fund Artists with the project SHAMANA DE CABARET. She is co-founder of LIMINAR ensemble; HOWL SPACE radical/experimental pedagogical voicehub, and BOSS WITCH PROJECTS, an artistic production company focused on the interconnection of experimental scenic works, sound/video art, interdisciplinary/intermedia works within natural landscapes, launching on 2021 with scenic piece BAJO LA SOMBRA DEL SOL, and VOX CLAMANTIS a trilogy of vocal recordings with Ron Athey, all produced in various ecosystems of California. Currently she is a faculty member of the VoiceArt program at CalArts.
Michelle Shiu-lin Lai
Tidals Ancient Rain is a Tidal Being. Live sculpting layers of text using a looper and solo dance. “ I meditate on "Ancient Rain" - a phrase and title from bob kaufman's prophetic poem - and use it as a guiding mantra to unfold the poetic risings from my own landscape of being- body, voice, texture, image. I explore the idea of the "ancient rain" as a tidal being... generational and omnipresent.... periodically rising and falling... flowing or ebbing.. arriving and departing...” We enter this space together as an offering and become TIDAL, washed of old structures.
Music: Loryn Napala (live Kora) and Zenji Oguri ((Modular synthesizer)
Michelle Shiu-lin Lai is a Los Angeles based interdisciplinary performance artist/poet and practicing architectural designer. She received her BA in Architecture from USC in 2007. Lai is interested in coming in touch with and expanding her awareness of the potential of the body/mind and to challenge her sense of what dance could be through a culmination of various practices. She explodes adjacencies in the present moment through an improvised process of live poetic sculpting and movement both in individual and group settings. Lai investigates the primal poetics of space through a process-based extraction of text through body memory/history, & butoh influenced sensitivity training. Lai recently shared her Subtle Body Workshop in Friday Harbor, WA, 2020. Lai traveled to Merida, Mexico January 2018 writing and presenting new poetry works at MEL as part of the USPIM conference. She is ever in awe working (2009-present) with Oguri & Roxanne Steinberg’s Body Weather Laboratory witnessing the deepening change and curiosity in her body experience year after year while witnessing the change in body, presence, and expression of those whom she practices with. She has performed with Lightning Shadow in works: "Caddy, Caddy, Caddy!" - Hammer 2016, Grand Performances: "Mare Imbrium"- CA Plaza 2015, "Kalpa" - Getty 2012, "Falling Water" Indianapolis museum of Art 2011 and more. Lai is an Alexander Technique Teacher in Training at ATI-LA.