This Saturday, May 9th, Multi TRaC will head to the Chelsea district on Manhattan's westside to check out some contemporary artists and gallery hop around the district for about two hours.
Where to meet: outside the Gagosian Gallery, located at 522 West 21st Street and the corner of 10th Avenue, at 1pm sharp!
How to get there: Take the C or the E train to 23rd street and walk towards 1oth Ave.
At the Gogosian Gallery, we'll see an exhibition entitled "Picasso: Mosqueteros" featuring hundreds of the late works by the famous Pablo Picasso! (All of the work in this show was completed when he was in his eighties in the 1960's and 1970's.)
He wrote of his work: I enjoy myself to no end inventing these stories. I spend hour after hour while I draw, observing my creatures and thinking about the mad things they're up to. --Pablo Picasso, 1968
"Picasso: Mosqueteros" is the first exhibition in the United States to focus on the late paintings since "Picasso: The Last Years: 1963-1973" at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in 1984. Organized around a large group of important, rarely seen works from the collection of Bernard Ruiz-Picasso, as well as works from The Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Museo Picasso Málaga and other private collections, "Picasso: Mosqueteros" aims to expand the ongoing inquiry regarding the context, subjects, and sources of the artist's late work.
Listen to this excited madman critic promoting the show:
Check out more about this exhibit on the Gagosian website. Google 'Picasso: Mosqueteros' to find reviews of the work and to learn more before we go!
After we spend some time with Pablo, we'll head out and see one or two other galleries in the hood. There's hundreds in the area, so we'll have to decide which together....
Get ready for our show on Wednesday, April 22nd, immediately following class!
ANGELA's MIXTAPE
By Eisa Davis
Directed by Liesl Tommy
With Kim BrockingtonDenise BurseEisa Davis
Ayesha NgaujahLinda Powell
Designers: Clint Ramos, Jane Shaw, Sarah Sidman, Jessica Jahn Production Manager Mark Sitko Production Stage Manager Ryan Radeuchel Assistant Stage Manager Danielle Teague-Daniels Props Johnson Henshaw Associate Producer Anna Hayman Casting Paul Davis/Calleri Casting Press Jim Baldassare
“On this mixtape, style will dictate, we bounce back and forth in time…”
Using the rhythms of music and memory, Eisa tells the story of a radical upbringing on the dividing line between Oakland and Berkeley, California-- in a family that includes her aunt, professor and activist Angela Davis.
Time shifts between the 70s, 80s, and 90s as smoothly as a DJ fading from song to song. Each track, each memory, has a built-in switch to the next, for theatrical momentum that keeps on building.
The music crosses styles and decades, but it's hip-hop and a b-girl stance that keeps the piece bouncing in the present.
Do some research on Angela Davis before the show! This will be also behelpful before you go into the show....
All mixed up?A short glossary of terms.
Back to the Future The most popular film of 1985 features Michael J. Fox as Marty McFly, a teenager who travels back in time from 1985 to 1955 and accidentally prevents his parents from meeting, putting his own existence at stake.Ronald Reagan quoted the film in his 1986 State of the Union Address.
CommunismAs codified by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, communism is the ultimate result of socialism, a process occurring only after capitalism has collapsed in on itself. In this stage of social evolution, the working class, bourgeoisie, and the ruling class can no longer exist. From the Manifesto: “Communism deprives no man of the power to appropriate the products of society; all that it does is to deprive him of the power to subjugate the labor of others by means of such appropriation.”
Davis, Angela Y.American political activist and professor of philosophy.In 1970, at age 26, Davis became the third woman and the 309th individual to appear on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted Fugitives List.A target of then-California Governor Ronald Reagan and FBI director J. Edgar Hoover’s Cointelpro policies, she was first fired from UCLA for her activism and membership in the Communist party, then charged with murder, conspiracy, kidnapping, and interstate flight after a gun registered in her name was used in an attempt to free the Soledad Brothers, political prisoners for whom she had sought justice.She went underground for two months before being arrested in New York City, and was acquitted of all charges in 1972.John Lennon and Yoko Ono’s song “Angela”and the Rolling Stones’ “Sweet Black Angel” advocated for her release.In the 80s, Davis ran for Vice President on the Communist Party ticket. Currently Professor of History of Consciousness at the University of California at Santa Cruz, Davis speaks nationally and internationally with a focus on the eradication of the prison industrial complex.Aunt of American playwright and performer Eisa Davis.
Flint’s Bar-B-QOakland, CA.Mmm, mmm!
GrenadaAn island nation peopled mainly by descendants of Africans in the southeastern Caribbean sea.A peaceful socialist revolution in Grenada toppled a dictator in 1979, then President Ronald Reagan and the United States invaded the country in 1983 in response to the government’s close ties with Cuba. Grenada’s population was approximately the same at the time of the invasion as it is now: a whopping 90,343.
Hip-Hop TheaterAs delineated by the Hip-Hop Theater Festival, live theater written by and about the hip-hop generation.Often using elements of hip-hop culture (including MCing, DJing, hip-hop dance, graffiti, spoken word), hip-hop theater tells urgent stories seldom represented on stage, through language that embraces hip-hop’s multi-literate and poly-lingual vitality.
MacrobioticFrom the Greek “macro” (large, long) and “bios” (life), is commonly known as a dietary practice based on the principles of yin and yang. Meals often include whole grains, legumes, vegetables (from earth and sea), and fermented soy. A macrobiotic lifestyle encourages living in balance with nature by eating local, seasonal and organic foods with the belief that this will lead to world peace.
MixtapeAlso known as a mixed tape.A compilation of songs recorded in a specific order, traditionally onto a compact audio cassette, it generally reflects the musical tastes of its compiler, which can range from a casually selected list of favorite songs, to a conceptual mix of songs linked by theme or mood, to a highly personal statement tailored to the tape’s intended recipient.Notable subgenres include the romantic mix and the break-up mix.
New York Women’s House of DetentionBuilt on the site of the Jefferson Market Prison thatsucceeded Jefferson Market at the corner of Sixth and Greenwich Avenues in Manhattan. Mae West, Billie Holiday and Black Panther Afeni Shakur, mother of Tupac, were some of the women arrested and held there before Angela Davis’s arrest. Believed to have been the world’s only art deco prison, it was demolished in 1973 and replaced with a garden and library.
THE FIRST is the New York Times review of the show, which is very positive. I thought this paragraph was interesting, as we touched on this in our discussion in class:
It’s telling that Kent, the play’s most vulgar character, is the one who speaks most easily, whipping out clichés and malapropisms as if they were pistols. The others wrestle awkwardly with language, and “reasons” is filled with instances of misinterpreted words and of people groping for mots justes that never arrive.
THE THIRD I find the MOST interesting. It's a presentation called The Sell: ‘Reasons to Be Pretty.’
Drew Hodges, the CEO of SpotCo, a Broadway advertising agency, narrates a slideshow of some of the rejected poster art for "reasons to be pretty" and talks about how they came up with the concept for the final ads. It involves putting out an ad on CraigsList and asking over 250 people to come in and tell their own stories about their bodies AND photographing them.
We'll be heading to the Lyceum Theater at 149 West 45th Street between 6th and 7th Avenues immediately after class on Wednesday, March 24th to see Neil LaBute's new play REASONS TO BE PRETTY. The show starts at 8pm is approximately 2 hours and 20 minutes. (Bring $$ or food so you won't be hungry during the show!)
Wednesday, 3/11, First class at AJC! PERFORMANCE IMMEDIATELY FOLLOWING CLASS: Paul Taylor Dance Company at City Center. 4:30-9:15pm.
Monday, 3/16, Performance: Ask Your Mama! (Music by Laura Karpman, on a text by Langston Hughes at Carnegie Hall. 8pm.
Wednesday, 3/25, Class at AJC. PERFORMANCE IMMEDIATELY FOLLOWING CLASS: Reasons to be Pretty on Broadway at the Lyceum Theater. 4:30-10:30pm
Wednesday, 4/22, Class at AJC. PERFORMANCE IMMEDIATELY FOLLOWING CLASS: Angela's Mixtape at The Ohio Theater. 4:30 - 10pm.
Saturday, 5/9, Chelsea Gallery Hop. Meet at the Gagosian Gallery, 522 West 21st Street at 10th Ave. 1:00-3:00.
Wednesday, 5/13, Final class at AJC. LAST PERFORMANCE IMMEDIATELY FOLLOWING CLASS: HOWARD ZINN AND GUESTS: A YOUNG PEOPLE'S HISTORY at the 92nd Street Y. 1395 Lexington Ave at 86th Street. 8pm!
Saturday, 5/16, The TRaC Finale! We will all come together to finish off TRaC in style.... details to come!
been there, done that.... in Fall 2008
DONE! Wednesday, 10/15 First Class! At the Dance Theater Workshop. 4:30 - 6:30.
DONE! Wednesday, 10/29 Class at new location! Meet at the Jacob Blaustein Building at 165 East 56th Street between 3rd Ave and Lexington Ave. 4:30 - 6:30.
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