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Monthly Archives: January 2012

“Group Sex on the Living Room Floor” by Amanda Davidson a work-in-progress play as part of “Mundane Fantasy” at BAX

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Group Sex on the Living Room Floor is a work-in-progress story about longing and debt, told by three performers of any gender who share the roles of a couple, their rivals, and an imaginary baby. Poised at the edge of a collapsing economy, these characters wrestle with the desire to escape, whether through online gaming or conversations with people who might not exist. With spare dialogue and a kaleidoscope structure, GSOTLRF shifts between real, virtual and imaginary worlds to ask: What does it mean to owe someone something? How do we connect under pressure?

 

Mundane Fantasy
February 10-11, 8PM
BAX/Brooklyn Arts Exchange (421 5th Ave)
$15/gen. $8/low income [Buy tickets]

Mundane Fantasy, curated by Faye Driscoll as a part of BAX’s Performance and Discussion series, features works by Dages Juvelier Keates, PARTED IN THE MIDDLE, and Sacha Yanow.

“I was drawn to these artists because of their unique creative perspectives and how they are each—in very different ways and through their various mediums— illuminating the relationship between the mundane, the personal and the mythical/fantastical with a smart, sincere and queer sensibility,” says Driscoll.

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PARTED IN THE MIDDLE, co-founded with Nathanial Putnam, is Amanda Davidson in collaboration with the world. partedinthemiddle.wordpress.com.

Jess Barbagallo is a writer and performer. She has performed with Big Dance Theater, Theatre of a Two-Headed Calf, and The Builders Association. She is a founding member of Half Straddle (The Knock-Out Blow, Sliding Whores, Nurses in New England, In the Pony Palace/Football, Away Uniform), the Red Terror Squad (Family Bed) and the Dyke Division of 2HC (Room for Cream. She has written the plays Grey-Eyed Dogs (Dixon Place Mondo Cane Commission), I’ll Meet You in Tijuana (Soho Rep Writer/Director Lab), Saturn Nights (Incubator Arts Project), and Men’s Creative Writing Group (Playwriting Resident of the Invisible Dog Art Center).

Aden Hakimi isn’t very good at bios but he likes you, so he’s going to try. Born and raised in the Bay Area, he studied Theatre at Northeastern University before packing up and moving to Brooklyn. Aside from performing, Hakimi keeps busy as a video editor (currently at MTV/VH1) He is the founder of Midnight Productions, an independent film company whose first feature film, “The Beverages,” he co-directed/edited/starred in. Most importantly, he is an Aquarius. He’d like to thank his cats, Pip and Little Bit, for keeping it real.

Kourtney Rutherford is a theater artist and adult/childhood educator. She has worked with several renowned downtown theater companies including Witness Relocation, Radiohole, Half Straddle, and Big Dance Theater, with whom she won a 2010 Bessie New York Dance and Performance award with the company for her work in “Comme Toujours Here I Stand.” Kourtney is approaching completion of her master’s degree in educational theater from City College.

Occupy Wall Street Has Ended All Of Its Housing Options: Non-Leaders Sit On Pile Of Money….

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This is a community solidarity proposal that Rami and I put together and proposed to G.A. last week…

Does anyone wish to see the OWS movement become violent?

-NO!

If we let a bunch of Occupiers, who have come from all over and have given their lives to this movement with the hope of changing this country and our world into a more inclusive space; if we let these people, who our movement has been taking care of, into the streets of New York at the beginning of February, without food and shelter, effectively cutting them off from the resources they have grown dependent on, we must understand there is a good chance one or a few of them will turn to violent means. Originally, this was brought to the GA as an emergency break-out discussion for the following reason: If any member of the OWS movement turns to violence, it creates an opportunity for the government to label the entire movement a terrorist movement and then every member must worry about consequences. Already the UK has given OWS the label, and rumor is our own government is waiting for the opportunity. On Wednesday night (01.18,12), at Spokes Counsel two fights broke out, fights that were caused due to there being haves and have-nots amongst us.If we don’t work to resolve this, we must understand this is only the beginning.

We are a community. We are a community living in the public eye of the world, demanding the larger world community work to take care of those amongst us that are disenfranchised. If we ourselves do not work to ensure all Occupiers are housed, fed, and working, we ourselves are no better than the society we are protesting. In the wake of housing options being cut,and access to G.A. funds being cut, we propose the OWS movement radically shift gears for a moment and work to ensure every Occupier become a self-sufficient member of our community. If we can become a self-sufficient movement, a group of people able to take care of their individual needs while protesting the great atrocities affecting all of us, then truly we can be a model able to change the world.

There is a huge disparity within our community, the top and bottom can and must learn from one another. Non-Occupiers need to understand that Occupiers can’t make it to many meetings as they’re forced to adhere to church hours, and Occupiers need to understand that non-Occupiers can’t always be out during the day since they have to work. And after this is understood, we must find a way for both groups to communicate and work together to ensure the weakest amongst us is self-sufficient and not seen as a burden or blight on our community. As a non-hierarchical movement, we must joyously lift up the weak amongst us while praising the already strong and everyone in between. We are a community. This must be our mantra.

We propose we work together to find every Occupier a home, a job, get those on food stamps that are eligible, get all those eligible for government subsidies on them, and ensure every Occupier is self-sufficient. And then, this Spring, when more people join our movement, ready to nonviolently fight with us, we must make it a priority to help them find employment and learn to be self-sufficient before leading them to places of protest.

During the Thursday GA (01.19.12), we broke out into discussion groups to address this topic. Many great ideas were already brought up: getting the Radical Social Workers involved; offering displaced Occupiers an easy transition into the New Haven and Newark Occupations for the remaining winter months; utilizing the Occupation force for fundraising, and have a larger breakout session outside of GA similar to Open Spaces. Almost everyone involved, whether they started hesitantly or supportively, at the end of our conversation was enlivened and understood the need for this. We ask that you join us on Tuesday as we solidify through discussion pragmatic ways to empower those Occupiers, who only three months ago, were being called heroes: help us form workshops immediately to offer our heroes key-knowledge, most take for granted,like resume creation and access to public welfare services, such as food stamps for those who are eligible If in three months, heroes can become bums, then the whole should once again cry, “Oh how the mighty have fallen.” But it will not be the heroes who have fallen, it will be the whole Movement, whether in the Office or on the Streets, and we will all rightfully be chastised for our fall!

The people with money in this movement have many times been the ones in the office, the ones using OWS money, and now in the coldest moment of our Movement, many of these very people are the ones shutting down spending…now I challenge you, if you have, to actively seek to help those amongst you that don’t have, help them to enjoy in the having. If this idea scares you,then I must ask you, why are you here?

Portraits by Dorje

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Remember my friend Dorje, he wrote the beautiful proposal for the success of the OWS movement. Anyway, he has a Portrait Project. He asks you send him a photo of yourself and he will turn it into a sharpy marker portrait drawing like the one above, and I believe he has a few other types of portraiture’s that he does. Besides being an artist, Dorje is also a BRILLIANT poet. Many nights while living in the park, I had the honor of listening to Dorje recite the many poems he has not only written but memorized. If you have any desire for an original portrait style drawing of a favorite photo, I urge you to contact Dorje at his website yourpersonalportrait.com. I love you Dorje (check out Dorje’s WordPress site for more)!

Join Us: Tuesday and Thursday of This WEEK!!!

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Tomorrow, January 24th 2012, the People’s Library requests everyone in solidarity with the library to join us at the Red Cube at 4pm. As many of you know, since the raid we’ve had quite a few encounters with NYPD and Brookfield Security resulting in the seizure of more books. It’s an outrage that books are being seized by the people in power and tomorrow at 4pm we are hoping you will join us and help us voice our outrage. We will require your participation for about an hour, and be sure to wear your walking shoes as we will be taking a little field trip… Join us as we fight against censorship and the seizure of books, and fight for the dissemination of knowledge and free literature. Please spread the word to all that are in solidarity with the People’s Library of Occupy Wall Street – Meet at the Red Cube at 4pm SHARP! January 24th 2012 at 4pm!

On Thursday, January 26th, 2012 at The Bowery Poetry Club from 5:00pm-7:30pm the Poetry Collective of Occupy Wall Street invites you to share your poems at our Winter Poetry Assembly. We imagine a kind of poetry town hall meeting where EVERYONE can assemble together and share words. This event is FREE.

The way Poetry Assemblies operate: show up, put your name in a hat, and eventually you’ll be called. This method is used to show that there is no hierarchy in determining the order.

Please choose a poem no longer than 3 minute. The Bowery Poetry Club has generously waived the usual entrance fee (it’s free!), but not the whiskey fee, which is understandable given the crowd.

Remember these devastatingly beautiful nights!!!

Dirty Looks Is Going on a West Coast Tour!!!

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Dirty Looks presents:
CHARLES ATLAS!
-filmmaker in attendance-
Wednesday, January 25, 8-10 PM
Judson Memorial Church
55 Washington Square South
New York, NY 10012
$7 Suggested Donation

Program
Son of Sam and Delilah, video, 27min., 1991
Butcher’s Vogue, video, 5min., 1990
Staten Island Sex Cult, video, 10 min. (excerpt), 1999
Instant Fame! Donald, video, 5min., 2005
Mrs. Peanut Visits New York, video, 6min., 1992-1999
The Draglinquents, video, 7min., 1990
I Fell In Love With A Dead Boy (from Turning), video, 4min., 2012
Dirty Looks, a monthly platform for queer experimental film and video, presents an evening of video work by Charles Atlas. With a career that spans 30-years, Atlas is one of the world’s most stalwart and vibrant videogrpahers of queer cultures and contemporary dance. This program will host a premiere of material from Turning, a feature-length collaboration between Atlas and Antony Hegarty, on the eve of the Museum of Modern Art commissioned Antony and the Johnsons’ Swanlights performance at Radio City Music Hall. Turning will receive its premiere in early 2012. Atlas will also be featured in the upcoming 2012 Whitney Biennial. With special performances from Leigh Bowery, Antony, and Carlos Morales (via Atlas’ rarely screened porn film, Staten Island Sex Cult), the works in this program cover more than twenty years of portraiture and collaboration at the vanguard of queer artistic practice.

“New York City 1988. Raging homophobia. A killer on the loose. Disco dancing till dawn. Performers struggle to survive. Delilah seduces Samson in song. Gender illusionists go shopping. Samson and Delilah, 1991.”

DIRTY LOOKS ROADSHOW

San Francisco//

//Thursday, Feb 9, 7PM Queer Conversations on Culture and the Arts @ CCA, 1111 8th Street, Timken Hall. Screening selections from the FEMALE TROUBLE program and a conversation with Margaret Tedesco. Free.

//Friday, Feb 10, 8PM City of Lost Souls a trans punk muscial by Rosa Von Praunheim @ Artists’ Television Access, 922 Valencia Street. $6

//Sunday, February 12, 2PM FEMALE TROUBLE, a Genderfuck Program @ YBCA 701 Mission Street (at 3rd), as part of the series Bros Before Hos: Masculinity and its Discontents, featuring film and video by Steven Arnold, Rick Castro, Vaginal Davis, Zackary Drucker, Matthias Müller, Narcissister, Patti Podesta and Conrad Ventur. $8

Los Angeles//

Tuesday, Feb 14, 7PM Dirty Looks: Long Distance Love Affairs @ The Hammer Museum, 10899 Wilshire Blvd. Featuring works by Cecilia Dougherty, Deanna Erdmann, Rhys Ernst, Glen Fogel, Mariah Garnett, Jonesy, Dani Leventhal, Charles Ludlam, Narcissister, Luther Price and Michael Robinson. Free admission, cash bar.

Thursday, Feb 16, 8PM FEMALE TROUBLE, a Genderfuck Program @ Human Resources 410 Cottage Home Street, featuring film and video by Steven Arnold, Rick Castro, Vaginal Davis, Zackary Drucker, Matthias Müller, Narcissister, Patti Podesta and Conrad Ventur. Rick Castro, Zackary Drucker and Narcissister in attendance! $8 suggested donation.

Portland//

//Thursday, February 23, 8PM FEMALE TROUBLE, a Genderfuck Program @ Grand Detour 640 SE Stark Street, featuring film and video by Steven Arnold, Rick Castro, Vaginal Davis, Zackary Drucker, Matthias Müller, Narcissister, Patti Podesta and Conrad Ventur. Sliding scale $3 – 6.

The Legend of Leigh Bowery (Film by Charles Atlas)

Keep Watching…. Continue reading →

INFINITE VIBRATIONS: tangents from liberty

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About two weeks before the raid on Liberty Square by NYPD, a group of 2-3 men started giving late night teach-ins. They used the chairs in the library so I sat in. The first night they talked at great length about the 13 powerful families that control the world and 9/11 conspiracies, luminously warning about the high level of courage one needs to engage with the extraterrestrial beings and terrestrial beings that have us enslaved. They continually explained that they were in the park to help us fight and open our eyes to the larger-than-life battle humanity is facing.

The three teachers each had a ranking. The lowest ranking member was a big guy who acted more or less like a body guard. Eric was the go-to guy, he came to the park every night, and he taught the first teach-in and referred often to his “boss” Chris. The first night I met Eric and the body guard, I sensed good vibrations. A well respected member of the OWS community introduced them and explained they had been coming regularly to the park and speaking to individuals privately about the 13 families controlling the world and wanted to spread their message in a more open and accessible way. They genuinely seemed to think they were helping us and they spoke with so much conviction I felt like I had to give them my attention.

At the first teach-in, Eric explained multiple times that he was the reason we had been allowed to remain in the park for as long as we had been occupying. He explained that he sat down with Mr. Zuccotti at his bed and poured him a glass of tea and asked Mr. Zuccotti if he enjoyed knowing his family was safe, nonchalantly suggesting to Mr. Zuccotti that harm would befall his family if he were to allow the NYPD to raid the park and kick out the demonstrators. He also explained that OWS needed to come to a clear consensus on its plan of action, that many high profile extraordinarily rich people secretly believed in the movement and would donate large sums of money to set the movement in motion if a plan to truly free humanity should arise. He explained that many of the men on Wall Street were just as much slaves or even more so slaves to the system we were fighting against. And that they secretly hope it is dismantled but that they have invested their lives in the systems and it seems impossible for them to break free from it. But they do see and feel the cries of all those around the world who have been marginalized and left out of the current systems. By threatening Mr. Zuccotti, Eric explained he had protected us and given us more time to work on enacting a plan. He suggested we dream big, and demanded we look into acquiring land that we could more permanently occupy on which we could grow food and create goods so we could truly break from the current systems. He showed us that by relying on donations and by using goods created by corporations; we in fact hadn’t broken away from the systems we are fighting. And true liberation would not be possible until we could function independently of the monsters we are pointing at and condemning.

Besides the grounded information and push for a more all-inclusive realistic revolution that considers how activists eat and where their shit goes while demonstrating to raise awareness about problems, Eric offered insights to a metaphysical, larger battle freedom fighters are up against. He explained that Mr. Zuccotti and other very powerful figures are in direct contact with higher forms of life. Eric called these higher beings “dragons” and described them as looking very much like a human but they have scale like skin that glimmers in the sun. When he described the physical characteristics of dragons, my mind immediately thought of the vampires in the Twilight film series.

There are many conspiracies online discussing an ever more powerful Alien race controlling humanity that has forever worked to enslave us. From the Bible to the Pyramids to Stonehenge, just about every aspect of the human story seemingly holds pieces of a puzzle that suggest this reality. Eric explained that he has been in contact with over a dozen other forms of higher beings. For the purposes of this story and what matters in regards to the conversation posed by Eric, is that the powerful men that adhere to these dragons are working to unify the world so that they have complete control. Continue reading →

New York City: A Bank On Every Corner!

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Have you noticed that on just about every corner of New York City there is a bank? How do the banks afford to place their business on every corner of NYC? Ground floor real-estate in NYC is very expensive. The many corners of NYC used to offer diverse and interesting businesses, but those days are gone. The banks aren’t just on every corner, they’re in every decision being made.

The White House Chief of Staff is the highest ranking member of the Executive Office of the President of the United States and a senior aide to the President.

The current White House Chief of Staff is Bill Daley, who was appointed into office on January 13, 2011.

William M. Daley recently served on the Executive Committee of JPMorgan Chase & Co.

Before Bill, Pete Rouse, served as Obama’s Chief of Staff after Obama’s first Chief of Staff left to be Mayor of Chicago. For 30 years, Rouse worked for Senator Tom Daschle who works for the legal firm DLA Piper (they deal with banks).

And before Pete, Rahm Emanuel served as Obama’s first Chief of Staff.

Rahm Emanuel was a managing director at the firm Wasserstein Perella’s Chicago office in 1999 and, according to Congressional disclosures, made $16.2 million in his two-and-a-half-years as a banker.