Soapbox Sessions (SBS) - DEBATE:
SBS is a series of curated events examining contemporary performance art, what it has to say, how it is said & why. Each session, three invited artists discuss & present their work in dialogue with each other and in relation to timely thematics (Gender, Directing Action & Alternatives to Now). This is a curated event & takes place in September 2014, February & April 2015 between 7-10pm.
(Double click images for full expanded version with links.)
April 2015: Directing Actions
Aliza Shvarts works with forms of reproductive labor, configured by philosophies of temporality. She is a PhD candidate in Performance Studies at NYU, where she writes on doom and extensity. Her work is situated in relation to an unresolved issue at the heart of performance theory and practice: the seeming irreconcilability between the event of performance and the iterability of performativity. Her work is at times theoretical and in other spaces physical. It is always performance.
Carlos was born in Caracas in the late 80’s. He works specifically in performance art and action derived works, developed by photography, video, installation and space interventions.Educated in Fine Art: Sculpture at the UNEARTE (2012) & recieving his Baccalaureate in Fine Art: Drawing and Painting from the Escuela de Artes Visuales Cristóbal Rojas (2005). Carlos has been exhibiting professionally since 2005. Photographer credits: Arjuna Capulon photographer credits: Arjuna Capulon
Helena Walsh is a live artist from Co. Kilkenny Ireland (based in London since 2003). Her practice explores relations between gender, national identity & cultural histories. systems, borders & rules that construct gender. Helena works with time, liveness & the materiality of the body in installation & site-specific spaces. Helena is a member of Speaking of I.M.E.L.D.A: a direct action feminist performance group challenging the terror of Ireland Making England the Legal Destination for Abortion
Aliza Shvarts works with forms of reproductive labor, configured by philosophies of temporality. She is a PhD candidate in Performance Studies at NYU, where she writes on doom and extensity. Her work is situated in relation to an unresolved issue at the heart of performance theory and practice: the seeming irreconcilability between the event of performance and the iterability of performativity. Her work is at times theoretical and in other spaces physical. It is always performance.
February 2015: Alternatives To Now
PPL are not bounded by discipline or field, we collect ourselves around processes, theorising social systems, ideological structures, modes of production, and epistemic genealogies via actions, relational constructs, images, noise, and objects. Past projects have included a durational diner, a silviculture museum, videos, full-length operas, workshops, singular and durational actions, conferences, concerts, gallery exhibitions, and various non-normative social situations.
Jörn J. Burmester & Florian Feigl met in the early 90s. In 2003 they founded Performer Stammtisch, an open network of Berlin based performance artists hosting monthly presentations & discussions of performance art. In 2011, Performer Stammtisch hosted a meeting of Berlin based curators & project spaces that in turn founded the Month of Performance Art – Berlin (MPA–B). Burmester & Feigl both have independent practices of solo performance work & they write and teach.
Owen G. Parry is a UK based artist and researcher working in contemporary performance and visual culture. His practice is research driven and often collaborative, exploring the intersection of pop culture and the avant-garde to create new mythologies in place of any consistent artistic language or style. Owen's current project Fan Riot explores the phenomenon of fandom at a time when intersections between the amateur and professional, artist and fan are diminishing: fanriot.tumblr.com
PPL are not bounded by discipline or field, we collect ourselves around processes, theorising social systems, ideological structures, modes of production, and epistemic genealogies via actions, relational constructs, images, noise, and objects. Past projects have included a durational diner, a silviculture museum, videos, full-length operas, workshops, singular and durational actions, conferences, concerts, gallery exhibitions, and various non-normative social situations.
September 2014: Gender
(b. 1980) is a New York-based video and performance artist. Hawk Swanson's work blurs the lines between victim and victimiser, care and punishment, self-love and self-objectification to examine the continually unresolved questions of contemporary feminism. Hawk Swanson received an M.F.A from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2006).
Kris Grey’s interdisciplinary practice is as shifting as the transgender artist’s genderqueer identity. With an MFA in ceramics, Grey casts objects that might be confused for (or perhaps double as) highly polished porcelain sex toys. These sculptures interrogate the economy and connotations of gendered objects through their anthropomorphic ambiguity. Grey also makes performance art, including the ongoing Ask A Tranny performances that confront the general public in an open forum.
O’Donnell (Dublin, 1978), is based in Belfast and completed a B.A Degree and Masters Degree in Fine Art at the University of Ulster Belfast. He has a studio in Platform Art Belfast and is a board member of Bbeyond performance art organisation. His practice is that of performance/action art, drawing and installation. He has exhibited his work at a national and international level and has been support by the Arts Council of Northern Ireland and the Arts Council of Ireland.
(b. 1980) is a New York-based video and performance artist. Hawk Swanson's work blurs the lines between victim and victimiser, care and punishment, self-love and self-objectification to examine the continually unresolved questions of contemporary feminism. Hawk Swanson received an M.F.A from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2006).
