Pramila Vasudevan: Dancebums, Emily Gastineau, Pedro Lander
“How can we be true to ourselves, while putting our best face forward? Especially when we’re hiding inside puffy parkas. “
Pramila Vasudevan curates Dancebums, Emily Gastineau, Pedro Lander
For Illuminate South Loop, Pramila Vasudevan has curated new work by DaNCEBUMS, Emily Gastineau and Pedro Lander. She writes: “These choreographers have unique voices and performative responses made of humor, critique, invention, and alarm. I am interested in how these artists can fill a viewer with emotion, questions, and a desire to move. I look forward to how their works will materialize at Illuminated South Loop.”
Each performance is approximately 20 minutes and all 3 will be performed in succession at 6 pm Thursday, February 1, and Friday, February 2 only.
DaNCEBUMS, Superfaux
Thursday and Friday, 6:55 pm – 7:15 pm
Superfaux is a precursor. A substance to kickstart something bigger. With this piece we’re only going skin deep and getting inspired by camouflage – disruptive coloration, concealing coloration, disguise, and mimicry.
How can we be true to ourselves, while putting our best face forward? Especially when we’re hiding inside puffy parkas. Known for our bombastic and energetic performances, this winter DaNCEBUMS will be blending into nature and pretending to be what we’re not. Not all risks look like virtuosity and strength. Sometimes they just look pretend.
This dance is highly self-aware. It watches itself, delights in contradictions, and tries to turn from real to fake and back again.
Created and performed by Kara Motta, Eben Kowler, Karen McMenamey Music by Eric Mayson
Emily Gastineau, The Claque (for Astroturf)
Thursday and Friday, intermittently, 6:15 pm – 7:25 pm
claque
a. An organized body of persons who, either for hire or from other motives, band together to applaud or deride a performance and thereby attempt to influence the audience (esp. in French opera houses ca. 19th cen.)
b. A form of extortion
c. A group of people hired to heckle a performer or public speaker
d. A group of sycophantic followers, fawning admirers, flatterers, or legacy hunters
e. A slap in the face or on the cheek
“It is no longer possible to regard the tear as an unmediated production of interiority, an expression of the secrets of the soul, or even a sign of emotion’s presence (either prior or imminent) in the subject. … [Tears demand to] be read and interpreted, for not only are they not pure expressions of the feeling self, they are fundamentally not to be trusted.” – Eugenie Brinkema
See also: rieurs (laughers), pleureurs (criers), chatouilleurs (ticklers), bisseurs (encore-ers)
“Emotion’s just so terrifying the world refuses to believe that it can be pursued as discipline, as form.” – Chris Kraus
See also: shill, laugh track, professional mourning, cheerleading, payola, astroturfing
Performers: Anat Shinar, Alys Ayumi Ogura, Justin Spooner, Charles Campbell, Beth Erickson, Kaya Lovestrand, Alison Hoyer, Linden Baierl, Emily Michaels King, Elle Thoni
Pedro Lander with Zoe Cinel, Masc4masc
Thursday and Friday, 6:15 pm – 6:35 pm
The blurred concept of masculinity that the Football industry upholds bleeds into all areas of society and affects all people. Toxic masculinity is rooted in misogyny, taught from a young age to children, negatively impacting female-identified, male-identi
Masc4masc will manifest as an installation on the performer’s body. Pulling from concrete imagery as well as abstract ideas. What does gender exploitation and oppression look like in a moving installation? We wish to share, through performance and visual creation, the specific ways in which these concepts are perpetuated and instilled in the public imagination.
Curator and Artists
Pramila Vasudevan is a choreographer and interdisciplinary artist and the founding Artistic Director of Aniccha Arts (2004). She is the Director of Naked Stages, an emerging artist fellowship for performing artists and also a teaching artist with Upstream Arts. She is a recipient of the 2017 Guggenheim fellowship and 2016 Mcknight Award for choreography.
DaNCEBUMS is a dance band working collaboratively and non-hierarchically in Minneapolis. Dubbed “the best dance party in town,” their work straddles the arty and the party – existing between precise technique and a casual pop sensibility. They perform in theaters, bars, music venues and parties.
Emily Gastineau is an artist who investigates contemporary spectatorship through performance, choreography, writing, and organizing. Her work has been presented locally and nationally as part of the performance duo Fire Drill. She is currently based between Minneapolis and Amsterdam, while studying at DAS Choreography, Amsterdamse Hogeschool voor de Kunsten.
Pedro Pablo Lander is a Minneapolis based, Venezuelan performance artist. Currently a teaching artist with the Pillsbury House Theatre and with Upstream Arts. Zoe Cinel is a multimedia artist and curator from Florence, Italy. She sees art as a platform for dialogue. Zoe is currently pursuing her Master in Visual Studies at the Minneapolis College of Art a Design.
Illuminate South Loop
Vitamin D is part of Illuminate South Loop, a three-day event at Bloomington Central Park (8100 33rd Avenue South) in Bloomington’s South Loop District from February 1 – 3, 2018. This creative placemaking initiative focuses on leveraging the power of the arts, culture and creativity to engage the community.