[note: many, if not most, of these links may no longer be working, but such is the nature of the digital. hopefully, the url and context are enough to help you find any further information you want. if not, feel free to contact me, and i’ll try to help.]
julio 2015
¡hola, difus@s!
having decamped to asbury park, i spent the month watching the waves (and the grill) more than the arts, but i still managed to see a few good shows on my trips back to the city. perhaps the limited opportunities to indulge induced a bit more focus in my selection, as most everything i saw explored the meaning of being human and the limits of identification. granted, these aren’t minor themes in artistic production (#duh), but they were plumbed more explicitly and thoroughly than i’ve often seen.
the fugard theatre and eric abraham’s a human being died that night at bam, chronicling the relationship between a psychologist on south africa’s truth and reconciliation commission and one of the apartheid regime’s major henchmen, adroitly plumbed questions of forgiveness, reform, and justice. though i sometimes wished the staging had been even more spare (like ivo van hove’s angels in america), the play was deeply engrossing, and the acting was superb. equally affecting but far more delirious (in a good way) was elevator repair service’s the sound and the fury at the public. their ability to turn the act of reading into theater (they work with texts verbatim) is sheer alchemy, but their handling of faulkner’s text surpassed even gatz. i’m still trying to get my head around it.
just before seeing the sound and the fury, i took in tom of finland: the pleasures of play at artists space, starting with the more archival show on walker and then the main show on greene. that sequence was entirely coincidental, but i’d recommend it. an ad man by day, touko laaksonen obsessively clipped and organized images of men from a wide array of magazines (popular and pornographic) into a series of “reference” albums, and the results are dizzying. the main exhibition of his drawings, beautifully installed on diagonal walls (a nice bit of architectural queering), didn’t, surprisingly, tame the work in any way. on the contrary, it felt even more vital and raw—especially on the eve of the supreme court’s marriage equality decision. don’t miss it.
the day after seeing the sound and the fury, i saw the tribe at film forum, which might well have been subtitled “the silence and the fury.” the film takes place in a school for the deaf, which has a rather brutal (semi-)organized crime syndicate running in tandem. the violence in the film is often extreme but never feels gratuitous or exploitative (and the abortion scene was even more devastating than 4 months, 3 weeks, and 2 days). what was most compelling about the film was its relationship to language; the dialogue is entirely in sign language, with no subtitles or voiceovers, so all we hear are ambient sounds. The effect is absolutely extraordinary, the film invites (even as it challenges) an empathy based not on dissolution of differences but, rather, on confrontation with their irreducibility.
with summer now in full swing, many performing arts spaces are dark or nearly so, but new york’s never without worthwhile things to see. this month’s picks lean more on art and film, but a few live performances are definitely worth catching.
art: i caught philippe parreno’s show at the park avenue armory last week and spent a full two hours with it (the time it takes to move through all the pieces); as a rethinking of exhibition practice for time-based media (or, more simply, an aesthetic experience), it’s pretty fantastic. (full disclosure: i did leave wishing they’d bring back stifters dinge.) doris salcedo’s mid-career retrospective is now up at the guggenheim, where matthew barnery’s cremaster cycle will be playing again for one saturday. other museum shows on my radar are gilbert & george at moma, im heung-soon at moma ps1, and piotr ulanski’s show at the met. the gallery shows at matthew marks, hauser & wirth’s chelsea space, julie saul gallery, and metro pictures (upstairs) are also on my list. if the weather’s pleasant, i’d also love to spend some time working my way through curbed’s list of summer public art.
music: as part of the ongoing lincoln center festival, heiner goebbels (of stifters dinge) brings harry partch’s delusion of the fury to town, and i’ve been dying to see this since reading about its inclusion in last year’s edinburgh festival (more background here). also at lincoln center, preludes should be phenomenal (especially after their ghost quartet at bushwick starr last fall), and miss julie intrigues me. the mostly mozart festival brings even more to lincoln center, and bric brings a number of more popular shows to the prospect park bandshell. between those two poles, the bing & ruth show at subculture looks interesting.
theater + performance: 10 out of 12, heisenberg, and happy days all end this month, so i want to catch at least one of them. i’ve heard good things about significant other, and i’d really love to see the twentieth-century way. awake and sing! opens at the public this month, and the absolute brightness of leonard pelkey opens at the westside theater; if you missed the latter this spring at dixon place, please don’t miss it this time. among the month’s more experimental / performance offerings, and that’s how the rent gets paid at the kitchen and a few shows at dixon place (port cities ny, pop out, and for the love of judy) pique my interest.
film: i met my quota (one) of mindless summer blockbusters last month, so i’m going back to non-blockbusters this month (ok, except for magic mike xxl). dirty looks: on location takes place all over the city this month, bringing some adventurous film to non-traditional spaces. stations of the cross has its premiere at anthology, and i’m really excited about it. abrons arts center brings some classics (and probably interesting crowds) out for its urban drive-in series, and bam turns out another incredible series with indie 80s.
dance: i simply cannot miss a piece entitled i’m sober. now what?!, playing for two nights at here. will rawls at bric and walter dunderville at jack should also be worthwhile, but most of the dance action this month is at jacob’s pillow.
granted, i’ll probably only get to a fraction of the above (and less of the below) during my limited time away from the beach (where i’ll be reading wendy brown’s utterly urgent new book), but i’ll see as much as i can. as always, sign your friends up here, especially before the fall season starts! i’ve already purchased a few fall subscriptions and am compiling calendars for the (now 40+) venues i usually cover. the fall’s looking very, very good.
abrazos,
p
julio / july
1-12: the sound and the fury (theater)
1-12: the qualms (theater)
1-18: 10 out of 12 (theater)
1-18: happy days (theater)
1-18: heisenberg (theater)
1-19: preludes (music)
1-19: at the table (theater)
1-19: twentieth-century way (theater)
1-31: dirty looks: on location (film)
1-31: mala mala (film)
1-: philippe parreno (art)
1-: lincoln center festival (music, theater)
1-: significant other (theater)
1-: the flick (theater)
2: bing & ruth / circuit des yeux (music)
2: port cities ny (performance)
6-11: gender / power workshop (performance)
6-: awake and sing! (theater)
7-8: i’m sober. now what?! (dance)
8-11: fjk dance (dance)
9-30: urban drive-in (film)
9-: the absolute brightness of leonard pelkey (theater)
10-16: stations of the cross (film)
10-25: pound (performance)
10-31: 10,000 km (film)
10-31: tangerine (film)
11: matthew barney: the cremaster cycle (art, film)
11: the new pornographers / thao & the get down stay down (music)
14-16: jeff weiss & richard c. martinez: and that's how the rent gets paid (performance, theater)
16: mr@bric process labs: will rawls (dance)
17-: indie 80s (film)
21: t-1: a live essay by evan calder williams (art)
22-26: ubu roi (theater)
22-: mostly mozart festival (music)
23: pop out (performance)
23-24: delusion of the fury (music)
24: the third annual tribute to portishead featuring the larceny chamber orchestra (music)
24-: horse money (film)
24-: phoenix (film)
25: dandy darkly's trigger happy (performance)
27-: miss julie (opera)
29-31: for the love of judy (performance)
30-: walter dundervill: arena (dance)