Visual Art: The Baby Jesus Invitational

More Precious than Gold  By Nancy Laurel Mary and Joseph Candles by Jimmy Riordan

Prayer Box by Saunders McNeill

Santasm by Michael Conti

Oh Come All Ye Faithful

Performance: Penny Arcade B!D!F!W!

 EXTENDED RUN: B!D!F!W! Penny Arcade
 "Arcade's strength is that she takes issues which divide and frighten people and exposes the absurdity behind them. A wonder to behold...Beg, steal a ticket."

-- Newsweek

~LAST WEEKEND~ 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday PLUS a Sunday performance (we call it Penny's Sunday service) at 5 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 20.

Performing Arts Market in Seoul 2011

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Contemporary Performing Arts in America

Written by Haeju KIM _ Researcher at National Theater Company of Korea2011.11.01

Contemporary Performing Arts in America
[Focus] Review of NPN Presentation at Performing Arts Market in Seoul 2011

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As a function of the Performing Arts Market in Seoul 2011, the members of the National Performance Network (NPN) of the United States introduced contemporary US performing artists and troupes at the National Theater of Korea on October 11, 2011. NPN comprises 61 artist-centered presenting organizations and the NPN Partners, representing every region of the country, and celebrates its 26th anniversary this year (founded in 1985). It aims to create meaningful partnerships among performing arts organizations and centers, to share the information on the contemporary artists, and provide financial support to the artists in the United States. From about a decade ago, it started expanding its exchange beyond the borders of North America with the title of Performing Americas. Now, it cooperates with Latin American artists and their groups, led by La Red, the association consisting of producers in the region. Moreover, it has been building cooperative relations with the Korea Arts Management Service as part of its KAMS Connection partner for 2 years. Now, the program mainly focuses on mutual exchange of information, and plans to pursue direct exchange among the artists of both sides.

What NPN focuses in global exchange is how to facilitate information flow and to build efficient information networks
What NPN focuses in global exchange is how to promote mutual exchange of artists and to build efficient information networks. Showing a work in the partner country is for mutual exchange of artists. Meanwhile, the latter is intended as a long-term vehicle for securing constant exchange, even when a counterpart is unable to put its piece on stage in the other country.

At its annual convention, each partner organization makes presentations on how performing arts are conducted across the United States. This year, NPN made it at the PAMS. This year’s presentation was a revamped representation of last year’s, focused on contemporary performing arts. Chosen for the presentation were four organizations representing the Eastern, the Western and the Central United States, along with the State of Alaska, to represent the entire country. The presentation also introduced a variety of experimental works touching on music, theatre, dance and other types of performing arts programs. Especially, centers dealing with multiple cultural genres participated as well, which simultaneously pursue art and performing arts programs.

Topic for Local Community

Producer of Out North in Anchorage, Scott Schofield introduced the programs concerning his local community with focus on the individuals copying with collective interests and environment. The programs seemed to arouse the demand for their meanings, interest and topics, in consideration of ethnic, race, environmental and political characteristics of the State. Schofield stressed that the company’s residency program contributes to creation of works enabling exchange with foreign local communities.

Teo Castellanos D-projects are the vehicle to deliver strong social messages, employing hip-hop and break dance. A recent brainchild of the program, Fat Boy is about poverty, famine and trash, and accommodates the pop culture of the 1980s, meditation, and social suggestions. Trained in contemporary ballet and jazz by trade for more than 30 years, artist and educator Leslie K. Ward showed a great interest in educational and local community programs. The 1000 Cranes for Alaska campaign, founded by her, is spreading across America, which is to prevent suicide. Lately inspired by her own experience with gypsy and carnival cultures, life in the Southern United States, and her Japanese heritage, she has released dance piece  Orphan expressed in strong vocal and colloquialism. A dance troupe, the Pat Graney Company worked out a 500-m2 intallation piece House of Mind, in cooperation with local folks. To represent the mental image of home, audiences are allowed not only to watch, but also to touch and feel things reminiscent of their memories about home, along with the performance of dancers within the structure. Based on the local culture arising out of his memory about his grandfather, who had been the last shaman of the Yupik people, storyteller Jack Dalton introduced works highlighting the importance of storytelling in preserving culture.

Contemporary Arts Delivered in Multimedia and Multi-genre Arts

George Lugg introduced multimedia works, who is the associate director of REDCAT that wishes to mark itself as the contemporary arts center representing the Western United States. Big Art Group expands the boundaries of theatre and its tools of expression by simultaneously projecting what actors do on stage on multiple screens. In addition, The People shows interviews with ordinary people about their concepts on democracy, war, terrorism justice, along with ancient Greek tragedian Aeschylus’s The Oresteia. It appropriately depicts how to communicate within a local community and how democracy was born. This work had toured Austria, Germany, San Francisco and New York, reproduced in distinct versions. Multimedia artist, Miwa Mateyek is the founder of Cloud Eye Control that resorts to media as performance tool. She created a work mingling animation with actual performance and installation. Myth and Infrastructure is a performance in which her silhouette intervenes over the screen where an animation is projected. The animation deals with primitive world and congested urban space. Paralleling fantasy with non-fantasy in combination of human body and virtual space, it expresses in metaphor collapse of the former.

In charge of performing arts programs at the Museum of Contemporary Arts Chicago, Yolanda Cesta Cursach paid attention to and introduced the artists that have worked on collaborative works in the city where more than 300 performing groups exist. Founder of Lucky Plush Productions, Julia Rhoads presented a dance performance The Better Half that reinterprets Gaslight of 1944, which deals with a wife who is led by her husband to the belief that she is a mental patient. The Better Half illustrates the instable human relations of today. Tsukasa Taiko At JASC is a tour group consisting of African-Americans and Asian-Americans in the United States. Incorporating the Japanese drum “taiko” and improvised performance by renowned jazz musicians, the group draws attention at diverse jazz festivals in the United States.

Representing Legion Arts in Minneapolis, Minnesota, John Herbert introduced pieces associated with music. Interested in grafting of contemporary music and mass media, composer Mikel Rouse has created a talk show-like opera in which he plays host and audiences participate as guests. His latest work Gravity Radio was born out of his inspiration about theoretically existing, but undetectable waves. This work is played in a mixture of the voice and the guitar sound carried by his own band, the string quartet recruited in the local community where it is played, short wave radio frequency, and live AP radio news broadcast.

Moreover, Hijack introduced Smithsoniansmith. The entity pursues low-tech esthetics through employment of a stage where ordinary things are intentionally stacked. Morgan Thorson from Minneapolis parallels physical moves with the language repeating at a place like an auction. He draws attention to his collaboration with the renowned Minnesota indie band Low.

Leads Killing Prejudices

It is impossible to understand the contemporary performing arts in the United States with brief images and summaries of the works presented during the 90-minute session. The presentation demonstrated how distinct genres and cultures try to accommodate each other and how the efforts are expressed. But it was not sufficient to give an insight into artists and hidden messages. But it sufficed to put out the prejudice that the United States lags behind Europe in terms of performing arts. The puzzle pieces thrown by NPN partner organizations helped put in perspective the broader picture of American contemporary performing arts. These leads hopefully contribute to exchange of the artists across the Pacific and to stimulation of mutual contribution.

Links

| the National Performance Network(NPN)   GO
| La Red   GO
| Anchorage Out North   GO

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Performance: Momentum Dance

6 choreographers, 13 poets, 18 dancers

Momentum Dance Collective in

Off the Page

A collaboration of artists and art forms.

An expression of 13 short poems as theme, movement, visual image and more.

A exploration of relationships, recovery, love, humanity and circumstance.

8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays, Oct. 13-15, and 20-22 at Out North.

Film: Independent Lens Series

KAKM and Out North present

Community Cinema

Free livescreenings from the upcoming season of the acclaimed PBS series Independent Lens

Every 3rd Tuesday through the season.

Find out more about the program and upcoming screenings here.

The series starts at 7 p.m. tonight, September 20, with a screening of

Pray the Devil Back to Hell

The story of how the women of Liberia stopped the country's civil war.

See a clip and come see the film.

Film: Three Veils

Out North could not be more excited to host a groundbreaking film that details the lives of 3 Arab-American women. The film, "Three Veils" is in its very first run on the festival circuit, and is sure to make big waves going forward.

Filmmaker Rolla Selbak and actress Sheetal Sheth traveled to Alaska last October for the screening of their films "The World Unseen" and "I Can't Think Straight." (The lesbian content in these films was mentioned as one reason a funder pulled $80,000 from Out North shortly thereafter.) The pair, impressed by the sold out houses and warm welcome they received, return again to show us their newest work.

June 10 and 11, Come mingle with these independent artists and watch the film "Three Veils" during a weekend of film-related events Sponsored by the Pride Foundation, and in support of Out North's Intersections film series.

Expect a good time, because we'll be grilling Alaska meat, dishing out vegan food, pouring wine, and showing a great film.

"Three Veils" centers on three Middle Eastern women living in the U.S., each with her own story about culture, family, love, faith, sexuality and more. It aims to portray the characters as human beings first, women second, and their cultural surroundings as veils that dictate how much of their inner selves are revealed. Watch a clip here: http://www.youtube.com/threeveils

Performance: Bridgman/Packer Dance

Because you loved them so much in 2008, Out North commissioned a new dance piece by Bridgman/Packer Dance. On an artistic high from becoming the first duet to receive a Guggenheim Fellowship, the two return to Anchorage with what Artistic Director Scott Schofield promises will be "the single coolest show you will see all year."

Choreographer/performers Art Bridgman and Myrna Packer, along with a multitude of their video counterparts, blend live camera, animation, and prerecorded urban settings to create multi-layered perspectives and surreal mindscapes amid a highly-charged alchemy of the live and the virtual. "Double Expose" is a fantastical, raucous, sensual exploration of identity, relationship, and the human psyche. In “Under the Skin,” the performers' bodies and costumes become projection screens creating a morphing and redefining of identities and the revealing of hidden psychological depths. Bridgman/Packer are Guggenheim Fellows, and Out North Contemporary Art House commissioned "Double Expose."

"The most thrilling dance work this reviewer has seen in recent memory...flat-out exhilarating."
- The Boston Globe

"in an age overrun with virtual dancing, the team of Art Bridgman and Myrna Packer stands out...by turns, witty, sexy, and surreal." - The New Yorker

Watch a clip: http://bit.ly/BPdiscovery

Performance: Jack Dalton and Allison Warden

Out North is proud to partner with two important community artists to present 

TIME IMMEMORIAL at the Sydney Lawrence Theatre

Join Alaskan Native Artists Jack Dalton and Allison Warden as they perform a journey of two souls, Miti and Tulu, who are born into different relationships through many lifetimes, weaving their way through important events in Alaskan Native history. In one lifetime they are sisters, in another, elder and child, in another, husband and wife and so on... Together, they weave a beautiful and moving story of Alaska Native people moving forward through time, through change, retaining their strength, culture and identity.

Technical Theater Training Workshop

April 18-21, 6-9pm at Out North
$15 each class or $50 for 4 classes

Matt Lawrence is the Technical Director of the Evergreen State College theater. He is also a freelance light designer, IATSE grip, and longtime tour manager/production designer. He has tech directed and designed Out North Artistic & Executive Director Scott Turner Schofield's solo work in spaces from Out North to the National Theater of Belgium, and has lit dance works in spaces as varied as the Capitol Playhouse in Olympia to Lincoln Center - among a long career of making live art work well and look pretty in tiny blackboxes and state-of-the- art facilities. He's an excellent tech and a great teacher.

Thanks to support from the Alaska State Council on the Arts, Matt will be in residence at Out North April 18-21st, offering four 3-hour classes in the basics of technical theater on the scale - and equipment availablity - of venues like Out North. Lighting, rigging, safety, and basic stagecraft will be covered. The plan is to create a basic skill-set that can then be refined and built upon at a particular venue in town.

We can take 10 participants and maybe more if there is desire. There are no limits or expectations as to background knowledge or age of the participants. It's affordable, and it'll be a lot of fun too.

UPDATE: This workshop served six participants , three of whom went on to occupy positions at local theaters.

Performance: Rhodessa Jones and Idris Ackamoor

THE LOVE PROJECT
CONCEIVED & PERFORMED BY RHODESSA JONES AND IDRIS ACKAMOOR
WRITTEN BY PEARL CLEAGE, ZARON W. BURNETT, RHODESSA JONES AND
IDRIS ACKAMOOR | DIRECTED BY HARRIET SCHIFFER-SCOTT
"Cultural Odyssey's Idris Ackamoor and Rhodessa Jones stole my heart with their delectable performances. . . . There's a message of everlasting love in 'The Love Project'." - Monica Hill, examiner.com
Part house party, part TV talk show, and part cabaret, THE LOVE PROJECT is an interactive experience that testifies to the network of human relations that define our times. 

Currently on tour performing at
La MaMa E.T.C. in New York City, The Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center in Tampa, Florida, 7 Stages Theater in Atlanta, Georgia and The University of the West Indies in Trindad, W.I. 
Don't miss it at Out North April 14-16

Visual Art: Ted Herlinger

I Love Ted Herlinger's Guts

It was pretty amazing to walk into the gallery with all these spheres floating in the air.  And then I started looking at individual spheres and it was even more amazing.  I know, some people think it doesn't take much to get me excited.  But these are special, especially the whole collection hanging in this lighting.

 

The exhibit is called Phase II.  The artist is Ted Herlinger.

They're made of reed, pork gut, and elk sinew.

Here's what the description said.

One more.

This post originally posted on What Do I Know?

Film: Teen pregnancy documentary project

Pro Creativity Film Premier Teen parents showcase their stories As part of Out North's education program, a dozen local teen parents worked with film professionals to learn story craft and film production to make short autobiographical films. Come see their films, meet the filmmakers, celebrate their success, and learn about the Pro Creativity project. Refreshments provided. 7pm Saturday January 29, 2011 Admission is FREE, families welcome This event encourages and supports Out North's Education Program

Moore Up North Episode 220 - ACLU - Domestic Violence - Polar Bears

Moore Up North Episode 220 - ACLU - Domestic Violence - Polar Bears 



INTERVIEW

Jeff Mittman is the Executive Director of the ACLU in Alaska which just
celebrated 40 years in The Greatland.

PANEL

Tom Brennan is the author of the "The Snowflake Rebellion" and regular
columnist for the Anchorage Daily Planet.

Jill Burke was a former anchor and reporter at KTUU Channel 2, and is
currently a staff writer at AlaskaDispatch.com.

Scott Schofield is an author, award-winning performance artist and the new
Executive Artistic Director at Out North Contemporary Art House.

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ACLU award

Notes from the Drawing Board
Scott Schofield, Executive Artistic Director

Out North Honored by AK ACLU as 1 of 40 Heroes of Constitutional Rights

Last Saturday, January 22nd, I felt incredible gratitude and an overwhelming sense of pride to attend the 40th Anniversary Liberty Awards of Alaska's chapter of the ACLU.

Walking past the frighteningly uncivil and factually incorrect truth truck from fanatical anti-choice pundits (whose use of the Freedom of Speech gave me a taste of the discomfort many say they have felt about Out North's work), I was welcomed into the Dena'ina Center by a sparkling list individuals who have made Alaska - and indeed, the United States - a free, civil and excellent place to live. A place where speech and privacy are protected in the Constitution. A place where thousands have struck out to do something new and different to make their life, and the lives of many, better and more truly free.

Standing on the stage to receive an award on behalf of Out North, to say I felt proud would be the understatement of the century. Shoulder to shoulder with people who have not gone quietly when people in power told them to hush, who have not silently accepted censorship or other abuses of the rights which are inalienable to every American - suffice it to say I felt schooled in the importance of what it is we do at Out North.

At Out North we don't sit silent in the face of injustice, we make art to shine and shout about it. At Out North we speak out when those with power abuse those without: through film, live performance, visual art, and making our space available to community groups for meetings and events. We will never pick an easy subject just because it might sell more tickets. And we will never be censored: not by funding pulls, not by protests, and especially not by the chilling effect that such acts have wrought on too many art spaces around the country.

I can only say that, by the way, because of you: our community that has stepped up in the face of our 9th funding cut in 25 years to say out loud that you want Out North here. And because of the ACLU, who has 40 years of shining success at making sure that I can say never with confidence.

Furthermore, I can only say all of this because of the work of our founders, Jay and Gene Dugan-Brause, and the many brave and passionate individuals who have served on Out North's Board of Directors throughout the years. I can only say this becase of you, our audience community. Read here a deep bow in respect for the bravery, the longsighted vision, and the commitment to the arts that every one of you have demonstrated.
For as much as all of this is truly meaningful, let's remember how much fun practicing and protecting the First Amendment can be! THIS is why [we] rock.

- Scott Turner Schofield

Visual Art: Photographer Dirk Spenneman

Third Friday Opening 1/21 5-7pm
Saturday 1/29: Community Gathering to Engage Homelessness in Anchorage
Dying on the Streets: A Photoessay of Homeless Deaths in Anchorage, 2010
by Dr. Dirk HR Spenneman

In total nineteen homeless men and women died on the streets of Anchorage in the twelve month period between 7 May 2009 and 18 April 2010. On the evening news, these deaths are reduced to momentary glimpses in a flickering modern visual universe. Even when we encounter the homeless personally, as we go about our daily lives, we mostly do so from the safe haven of our cars, the wound-up windows safely shutting out the real world. The images in the exhibition are the stark and unembellished reality: death is stalking the lonely on cold streets.

Visitors to the gallery are asked to please bring lightly-used warm clothing and/or non-perishable foods.
Out North seeks volunteers for a sandwich and chilli making party on Friday, 1/28 from 5-7pm. We will be preparing food for the event on Saturday 1/29 from 1-3pm. Please call Riley at 289.8099 ext 206 with your interest in helping.

"Under :30" 2011

image by Craig Updegrove

Four spaces

By Dawnell Smith | Posted: Wednesday, January 12, 2011 12:00 am

“Under :30” represents a time limit, an opportunity, a shot at front and center.

The program works like this: Folks submit proposals around March, and Out North selects four to develop from page to stage in just under a year. The creator does the heavy lifting to transform idea to manuscript, and Out North provides technical and production resources to transform the manuscript into performance.

Some of this town’s most refreshing monologues, travelogues, comedy routines and real life stories have emerged from this program, many by people who are not performers.

This year’s cast includes UAA professor and poet Olga Livshin ushering the audience through her Russian immigrant experience; artist and docent Linda Lucky sharing her journey as the caretaker of a friend experiencing Alzheimer’s; consultant and wilderness guide Ellen Maling exploring life and job transitions and decisions; and public health consultant and comedian Duff Pfanner wondering if being vertically challenged is an inferior trait.

Out North’s executive and artistic director Scott Schofield selected this year’s four pieces. “I didn't so much choose these works as react to how clearly they fit together,” he says. “Each explores ‘space’ in its own way: the split space of an immigrant's memory and present; negotiating the spaces of life and work; taking up space with physical size; and then the space of a long journey through memory and eventually death, which took place in the day room of an Alzheimer's facility.”

He considers the program as remarkable as any in the nation in terms of longevity (this is the 17th annual performance) and appeal. Year after year, Alaskans use autobiographical material to create poignant, mind-blowing, silly, absurd, titillating, eye-opening, you-name-it performances about everything from cycling and family roots to conspiracy theories and the secret lives of art instructors.

This year’s show will be performed four times instead of eight to save on production costs. Over the last few years, the first and last shows have sold out while the other six shows didn’t, says Schofield, a major funding cut earlier this year just doesn’t allow Out North to absorb the overhead costs.

“So we hope that Anchorage will pack out the four shows to make a stellar experience for the artists and help Out North get back on our feet financially,” says Schofield.

Cutting down the number of performances also precludes me from doing a review before the show ends, but I can give you a run-down on a few pieces, including Maling’s light-hearted look at tough decisions.

“It’s basically about me trying to figure out what I’m going to do with the next stage of my life,” she says, “and about reconciling different forces in life.”

Her one-woman show includes a song, monologue and interplay with the audience, and pits her drive for working in developing countries against the reality of managing her diabetes. The piece touches on the economic downturn, and the struggles and debates concerning medical insurance, but it mostly centers on the decision-making process.

How do we weigh our dreams and passions against physical and financial health? What obligations tie us to our communities? When should we risk what we know to find what we’ve yet to imagine?

And what do these considerations mean to a wanderer who used work as a river guide, who has maturity but no ties, who has felt the sting of loss and now feels the pull of freedom despite her dependence on medical systems?

Call it nonfiction-theater, if you will, or good old-fashioned storytelling with some slides for good measure, but this and the other three pieces all touch on extremely personal experiences.

“For audiences, it’s ‘reality TV, minus the TV,’” says Schofield. “That is to say, honest, thoughtful, inviting—scandalizing sometimes, too.”

No, these performers won’t do inane, stupid, outrageous things just for the laughs and hype, but they will reveal parts of themselves. Pfanner’s piece about being vertically challenged doesn’t wallow in short jokes as much as unearth a human story and relationship.

After seeing about ten “Under :30” performance over the years, Pfanner finally decided to submit a proposal because “I felt like I had discovered a personal truth about myself as it relates to growing up short and being short, “ he says, “and I felt like I had some life experiences to share about how being short had impacted my life in particular as related to my daughter.”

Though he has done stand-up comedy before, Pfanner has never prepared for or performed a more theatrical piece.

“There’s so much more than you realize,” he says. “When you see a stage production, you know the actors and actresses have spent a lot of time with their lines, but doing this has given me a better sense of the backstage effort—the artistic direction, the lighting, the nuances of voice and connotation, the different ways of looking at the same word.”

Schofield has proved invaluable to the process for Pfanner and others; though he has mastered things like nuance and enunciation, Schofield feels awe each time he sees an “Under :30” performance unfold.

“’Under :30’” is the place to see what too much theater has forgotten,” he says. “That humans make stories and that they are delightful and fascinating and moving in their rawest form.”

AN OUT NORTH FUNDING UPDATE

A national funder pulled $80,000 from Out North because of the theater’s programming, which included films with lesbian characters and a production of “Reefer Madness.” Out North set two goals after the funding cut. They topped the first one—$40,000 by New Year’s Day—with $46,000 by the end of 2010. They hope to raise another $36,000 by Valentine’s Day.

Schofield says, “What's amazing is that a huge proportion of the donations are in increments of less than $250, and the majority of those are coming in at less than $75. Those who can are giving big, and it seems everyone is giving what they can. We are humbled and empowered by this incredible support.”

Under :30 will be performed at 8 p.m. Thursday, Friday and Saturday, Jan. 13 through 15, and 3 p.m. Sunday, January 16, at Out North. Tickets cost $20 at the door, $16.75 on CenterTix.net, and $13 for seniors, students and military members with ID.

Artistic Director Scott Turner Schofield

"He has comic timing tattooed on his genes" - Scott Schofield Performs at Out North

Scott in January

I first saw Scott Schofield last January when he introduced the Under 30 performances.  At the time I was surprised by his easy presence in front of the audience.  There was something special about him, though I didn't quite catch what he was doing here, something about being a visiting performer.  We missed his performance of Debutant Balls because we went to Juneau.

Scott after Wu Man

In July he introduced Wu Man and friends.  This time Scott was introduced as Out North's new artistic director.  Again, I was impressed.   Enough to write this as a side note to a long discussion of Wu Man and the evening's music:

His introduction Wednesday was a pleasure to listen to.  His words were good, his delivery fluent, and he effortlessly rotated to acknowledge the audience members sitting behind him on the stage. 

I'm giving all this background to just say, there was something special about this guy which I picked up from the time I first saw him.  Friday night I learned that he is an established performer who has performed all over which was brought home when in one of his pieces he mentioned that he'd 'just played to a packed house in Brussels."

So, my gut was right.  Out North has pulled a minor coup by snagging Scott as the artistic director.  He's closing in on his 30th birthday (this also came out - I think in the Q&A after the performance) and looks like he's approaching 20.  But he's been performing a long time and knows lots of people beyond Anchorage, a number of whom he's going to entice up here and introduce us to.

Friday night (and he does this again Saturday - tonight) he was on stage at Out North as a performer, though he confessed afterward that he couldn't completely get his administrator role out of his head  asking himself, as a performer and an administrator, "Is this show going to go well?  Is this going to help or hurt our future box offices?"

He didn't have to worry.  This guy is a natural story teller. He says raconteur, which I can't write unless the spell checker has it. (Phew! It did.) And his material is compelling.  The program says,

Two Truths and a Lie. . . is a collection of three autobiographical solo performances which have toured nationally to critical acclaim:  Underground Transit (2001), "Debutante Balls" (2004) and "Becoming a Man in 127 EASY Steps (2007).  

After Show Q&A

He gave the briefest of introductions - I'm not even sure what he told us.  Enough for us to know that he was born and raised as a girl and the title "Becoming a Man" meant just that, literally.  So, he had 127 steps.  Our job as the audience was to give him numbers and he'd find that particular step and perform it.  Or, as it turned out once or twice, show us the video.

I don't know a lot of people who have changed genders and the couple I can think of switched from male to female.  And it wasn't something we talked about.  I listened to Tafi's presentation focused on male Samoan children who are early identified as Fa 'afafine at UAA's Diverse Voices presentation.  I've read Middlesex.  My favorite documentary at the Anchorage International Film Festival last year wasProdigal Sons told by a woman returning to her rural home town for her 10th high school reunion who left for college after being the quarterback of his HS football team.  I'm sympathetic to the idea, but the male-female dichotomy is still one of the most rigid we have.  Homosexuality still causes many people grave distress.  The idea of being a woman and then a man or vice versa challenges our brains' flexibility.  We think it has to be either/or.

In the book - Two Truths and a Lie - Scott writes about coming up with this performance.

"Okay," my partner-in-crime S. Bear Bergman sighed as ze [sic] always does when calming me down on a late night, long distance phone call.  "So you have about 127 stories to tell and an hour in which to make sex change EASY, step-by-step."  I made notecards from memories, ruminated, and typed.  Then I found one of my old Choose Your Own Adventure books from elementary school.  Later, on tour in New York, T Cooper and Felicia Luna Lemus left Joe Meno's book The Boy Detective Fails by the couch they made up as a bed for me.  There I found the decoder ring.  With such random origins, how could I write any linear play?  The elements of chance that structured my process had to be reflected in the product.

Scott performs Two Truths and a Lie again tonight (Saturday) at 8pm at Out North.  Tickets at the door.  It will be a different performance from the one we saw because the audience isn't likely to choose the same numbers.

Now, as much as liked this, I think it could have been even better.  The lottery aspect of the audience choosing which scene he's going to play means there are a lot of missing parts and the actor doesn't know which scene is up next. 

Even with that caveat, Anchorage folks, what I'm saying here is WE'VE GOT THIS WORLD CLASS PERFORMER TELLING THIS MESMERIZING STORY AND NO ONE KNOWS IT.  So go now and see Scott.  In ten years when he's moved on and he's famous, don't kick yourself because you didn't see him 'way back when' in an intimate little theater in Anchorage before the world discovered him.

As Judith Jack Halberstam, Professor of English and Gender Studies at USC, wrote in the front of Scott's book,

Scott, it should be said up front and often, is simply a mesmerizing performer.  You could listen to his voice all night.  He has comic timing tattooed on his genes, and he can make the trip from irony to sincerity in 3 seconds flat. 

Visual Art: Dia de los Muertos

Dia de Muertos
Exhibit of Contemporary Altars

The Day of the Dead is still an active tradition in Mexico celebrated in the pre-hispanic tradition linked to the agricultural harvest. During this celebration, millions of Mexican people go to the cementaries to pay a visit to their loved ones in the midst of offerings, tears, music and food. For the pre-hispanic people, "death is not the end our our existence, it is only the path of transition to something better."
The Exhibit of Contemporary Altars features altars by local artists, families and community groups, with a special altar dedicated to Alaskans who have committed suicide. According to the artists who have created this special altar, "in the spirit of dia de muertos, we invite the spirits of the victims of suicide in Alaska to come visit and enjoy the foods and smells they once loved."
The exhibit is at Out North through November 15, 2010.

New Work: "Pivot Point" premiere reading

Brand Spankin' Drama SeriesA new offering at Out North in Season 26, Brand Spankin' Drama is a live "music stand reading" of new plays, never before produced/never published. Playwrights from Alaska, national and international renown.
Each event features a full cast to perform readings.
There will be quarterly readings in this series throughout Season 26.

Join us on November 1, 2010 @ 7:00pm 
as Out North presents the first Brand Spankin' Drama:
Pivot Point
by Paul Bryner

About the Play

Nicole, an out-of-work journalist, comes home to find the house empty. Her husband, Phillip, has been taken to the hospital. His condition is dire. Still, Nicole opts to leave the country, abandoning both her husband and her twelve-year-old son in favor of a story that obsesses her, a story in the faraway island nation of Sri Lanka, which is in the midst of an upheaval so great that all foreigners have evacuated the country. The upheaval has been dubbed the “Last Revolution.” As Nicole prepares to sail for Sri Lanka, her son, Chester, and his best friend prepare for a make-believe voyage to an imaginary island and Nicole’s husband is on the operating room table, being sung to sleep in a mysterious preoperative ritual.

About the Playwright

Paul Brynner is an Anchorage actor, writer and visual artist. He has previously written one novel, The Conception of Sphinx, and is currently hawking a bunch of surrealist-pin-up calendars plus posting an on-line political satire comic called Miller Vs. Murkowski: The Final Showdown!” at NonsenseGirls.com. He has previously written several plays for the Alaska Overnighters.

“…After that in a more conciliatory spirit he asks Brewster:
‘So, what’s it like in Ceylon?’
A rhetorical question if ever there was one, for as far as Lawrence is concerned he
‘would rather go to Mars or the Moon. But Ceylon if there’s nothing better.’”

—Geoff Dyer, Out of Sheer Rage

This reading lasts approximately 75 mins followed by Q & A with the author.
Admission is $7.50 at the door.

Visual Art: Alzheimers Group Show

Untitled Trees by Bert

EXPRESSIONS:
Artwork of Alaskans with Memory Impairment
October 15, 2010 - November 13, 2010
Gallery Hours: Noon to 6pm, Tuesdays through Friday
Curator: Fran Kelly of Alzheimer's Resource of Alaska

The Alzheimer's Resource of Alaska and the Alaska Mental Health Trust Authority have partnered to present "Expressions," a unique art show displaying artwork of Alaskans with memory impairment.

This artwork is created by participants in Art Links, a program offering individuals with dementia a means of self-expression through the process of painting and drawing. Often a person experiencing memory loss loses the ability to communicate verbally. Art Links is an opportunity to share in their memories. And as they say, a picture...