Name: Mark Yeoman
Title: Artistic Director
Affiliation: Noorderzon Festival, Groningen, the Netherlands

1. Where did you grow up and how did you end up where you are now?

South of England. Was an actor and freelance director, til i followed my wife to a new city (she had a new job here in Groningen) and fell through this worm hole in space. Thought that directing a piece of theatre, and directing a festival must be similar occupations. They’re not (I now know!).

2. What do you look for when you’re seeking out new work?

Relevance.

3. What was your most remarkable moment as a curator/presenter/producer?

Kharkiv, Ukraine, March 2003, “Month of Love” dir. by Andriy Zholdak, Act One.

4.Which performance, song, play, movie, painting or other work of art had the biggest influence on you and why?

Ryuichi Sakamoto solo piano CD, Coda – ‘go back to the beginning and start again’.

5. What skill, talent or attribute do you most wish you had and why?

Self-cloning at will ( and back again). Useful for programmers  needing to be in several places at once.

Ch-ch-ch-check it out!!!

If Ed Sullivan and David Lynch produced a lovechild, this show would be it! Jonathan Jacobs AKA The Vintage DJ directs and hosts the first of his series of spectacle-based concert events. Ferocious Spectacular – Episode One: The Black Death features the haunting music of countertenor singer, songwriter and pianist, M. Lamar. With hypnotic dancing by the Ferocious Spectacular dancers: ‘The Species’ and the grotesque comic stylings of ‘Crabcake.’

Jonathan Jacobs AKA The Vintage DJ
proudly presents
FEROCIOUS SPECTACULAR,
Episode One: The Black Death
Featuring the original music of M. Lamar.
With the sultry dancing of ‘The Species’
And the grotesque comic stylings of ‘Crabcake!’

THREE NIGHTS ONLY!!!

Thursday, July 16th @ 8pm
Friday, July 17th @ 8pm
Saturday, July 18th @ 8pm

@The Chocolate Factory Theater
5-49 49th Avenue
Long Island City, NY 11101

SEATING IS LIMITED!

Booking:
Tickets are $15 and may be purchased in advance via theatermania at (212) 352-3101 or on the web @ www.chocolatefactorytheater.org.

Getting there:
7 to Vernon/Jackson; G to 21st Van Alst

Creator and Director: Jonathan Jacobs
Producer: Maedhbh Mc Cullagh
Vocals and Piano: M. Lamar
Ferocious Spectacular Dancers ‘The Species’: Jessica Jelliffe, Sara Pauley, Saori Tsukada
Special Guest ‘Crabcake’: Ilan Bachrach

To continue with the theme of “Guides to Living in the Information Age” I’ll point you towards this great interview with Douglas Rushkoff on Reality Sandwich.

In his new book, Life Inc., media ecologist and author Douglas Rushkoff tells the story of how the corporation has made us over into its own image, how we have altered our reality to serve its needs, and how we can take it back. In this conversation, Douglas illuminates the Dark Ages, reveals why there’s a God on our money, and explains what we’re really buying into when we buy that mortgage. We have the code to open-source everything, he says.

These ideas refer back, if obliquely, to what I’ve been writing about with deep reading and the fetishization of live experience. More to come on making those connections . For instance, Rushkoff on Renaissance culture:

The first individual in Renaissance literature was Dr. Faustus, who represented the extreme limits of greed. This was the new man, not a citizen of the city-state but an individual who has his own perspective on the world. We get perspective painting in the Renaissance, which meant the individual was a self-sufficient being whose point of view is important; we get reading in the Renaissance, which meant that a man can sit alone in his study and have his own relationship to the Bible, instead of gathering in the town square or the church, having the Bible read to him by a priest, as part of a congregation. So on the one hand it was this beautiful celebration of individual consciousness and perspective, but on the other it was all in the context of a new economy, one in which individuals were in competition against one another for scarce jobs, scarce resources, scarce land, and scarce money.

In 1928, the 26-year-old Felipe Alfau, a recent émigré to New York from Barcelona, strafed the prologue to his picaresque first novel, Locos: A Comedy of Gestures, with dares, complaints, and disavowals. The reader was invited to begin the book at any page and proceed in any direction. Despite praise from reviewers when finally published in 1936, Locos soon sank without a trace and only bobbed up again half a century later when an editor came across a copy at a barn sale.

The reissued edition’s many fans included Mac Wellman, who has now put it into the hands of three writers from the Brooklyn College Playwriting program – Richard Toth, Scott Adkins and Normandy Sherwood.Each playwright has adapted one story from Locos for an evening of three plays at the 13th Street Theater:

Richard Toth’s Identity by Scott Adkins and Normandy Sherwood By Richard Toth

In which a boring man kills himself in order to become a character, with terrible results

The Character By Scott Adkins

In which a character relates the sad story of his love for a real woman, and messes up the story while the author is on a break

The Necrophil By Normandy Sherwood

Concerning Dona Valverde, a funeral-hunting widow whose only love is death

All three plays will be directed by Meghan Finn, with dramaturgy by Allison Lyman.

The cast includes Yehuda Duenyas, Juliana Francis-Kelly, Kate Benson, Cat Cabral, Neil Hellegers, Lucy Kaminsky, Matt Korahais, Michael Lister, and Travis York.

The Weasel Festival, now in its fourth year, is a festival of plays written and produced by playwrights from Mac Wellman’s Brooklyn College MFA Playwriting program.

The Bring a Weasel and a Pint of Your Own Blood Theater Festival will run at 7:30pm from July 17 through July 19 at the East 13^th Street Theatre, 136 East 13^th St., New York, NY.

Admission is a suggested $15 at the door and tickets can be reserved by emailing bringaweasel@gmail.com. All three plays will be performed each night

]]> http://culturebot.org/2009/07/10/bring-a-weasel-and-a-pint-of-your-own-blood-2/feed/ 0 Andy http://culturebot.org/2009/07/10/music-and-podcasting-camps-for-teens/ http://culturebot.org/2009/07/10/music-and-podcasting-camps-for-teens/#comments Sat, 11 Jul 2009 03:12:11 +0000 Andy http://culturebot.org/?p=4157 ]]>

Is your teen really into music or multi-media? Nurture their interests at a Harvestworks Summer camp program. This year we will again be offering our popular Digital Music Camp and our new Podcasting Camp both for ages 14-18.

DIGITAL MUSIC CAMP - Click here for a complete curriculum
Ages 14 – 18
Instructor: Gisburg
JULY 20 – 31, Monday – Friday 1pm – 5pm
Cost: $650 + $75 for the membership
Over the course of two weeks we will learn the complete process of music production. Beginning with creating our original musical material together, we will record in our studios, edit and mix using ProTools software, master and design our finished CD and perform a concert at Harvestworks on our final day.

Note: Musicians have to be on a medium level and have to have interest in every aspect of creating a “professional” music product.

Click here to sign-up

PODCASTING CAMP - Click here for a complete curriculum
Ages 14 – 18
Instructor: Gisburg
JULY 20 – 31, Monday – Friday 9am – 1pm
Cost: $650 + $75 for the memberships
In this Camp we will produce a finished Podcast, which includes script writing, recording techniques, and sound editing using the ProTools and Garageband software platforms. We will also learn how to build an easy website for posting the Podcasts on the web.

Podcast (defined):  The distribution of audio or video files, such as radio programs or music videos, over the internet using either RSS or Atom syndication for listening on mobile devices and personal computers.

“The medium that promises a future where anyone can make radio, instead of just listen to it.” – Wired Magazine

Click here to sign-up

–
Harvestworks is a non-profit arts center in Lower Manhattan. Private funding for our programs has been provided by the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, the Jerome Foundation, the Mary Flagler Charitable Trust, the New York State Music Fund, the James E. Robison Foundation, New York Community Trust, the Carnegie Corporation, the Aaron Copland Fund, the Greenwall Foundation, the Edwards Foundation Arts Fund, the Trust for Mutual Understanding, Materials for the Arts, the Experimental TV Center and mediaThe foundation Inc. Public Support is provided by New York State Council on the Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts and the NYC Dept. of Cultural Affairs. Thanks to our Friends Circle, Cycling74, Digidesign, Inc. and NHT Pro.

Mark your calendars now!

On August 14, the Guggenheim Museum launches It Came from Brooklyn, a new monthly concert series that will showcase Brooklyn’s emerging and established talents in the fields of music and literature as part of the museum’s 50th Anniversary celebrations. Conceived as a tribute to the recent Brooklyn renaissance and to serve the visual art scene’s appetite for interdisciplinary creative exchanges, each program will feature two live bands and readings by Brooklyn-based writers from 8 p.m. to 12 a.m.

The second It Came from Brooklyn is scheduled for September 25.

Coproduced by author Sam Brumbaugh, the series will take place in the Guggenheim’s famed Frank Lloyd Wright–designed rotunda, continuing the recent tradition of acclaimed performances that have symbiotically activated the space: Marina Abramovic´’s Seven Easy Pieces (2005), Cai Guo–Qiang’s collaboration with the Cloud Gate Dance Theatre (2008), and Meredith Monk’s Ascension Variations(2009).

With comedian Leo Allen serving as MC, the August 14 program kicks off with a special performance by the Brooklyn Steppers Marching Band, followed by opening band High Places and headlining band the Walkmen, while novelist Colson Whitehead reads selections from Walt Whitman between performances.

Tickets go on sale July 14 at guggenheim.org/brooklyn: $45 for non–members, $40 for members.

MORE INFO AFTER THE JUMP

About The Walkmen
The Walkmen is a rock band that formed in New York in 2000. In the late ‘90s, the members of the band constructed an analogue recording studio in an abandoned Nash Rambler factory in West Harlem, where they self-recorded their first album,Everyone Who Pretended to Like Me is Gone. The band has released four albums of original material, including You and Me (2008), which still sounds as fresh as the day it was conceived. Three of the members now reside in Brooklyn, while two have moved to Philadelphia. The band has traveled extensively around the world in the last eight years, but has always called New York home. The Walkmen are currently in New York recording their fifth album, which is slated for release in early 2010.

About High Places
High Places is an experimental musical duo that originated in Brooklyn and is known for its DIY, layered compositional style. Multi–instrumentalist Rob Barber and vocalist Mary Pearson met in 2006 while Mary was studying bassoon and Rob was teaching lithography and etching in New York. Recorded in the band’s Bedford–Stuyvesant apartment, High Places’ self–titled debut features their celebrated “exquisite corpse” style of songwriting and employs a wide array of instruments, from the 12–string guitar, banjo, shakers and rattles, bass, bells, and kalimba, to common household objects, like a plastic bag, mixing bowl, or wood block. Favoring an organic and contemplative sound, the band is particularly inventive in a live setting with ambient vocals, manipulated layered recordings, improvised loops, and percussion.

About Brooklyn Steppers Marching Band
The Bedford–Stuyvesant–based youth marching band, the Brooklyn Steppers have thrilled audiences throughout the country for more than 15 years. The 120–piece band includes woodwinds, brass, percussion, dance, and flag and is comprised of students grades 5–12 from more than 40 Brooklyn schools. Considered one of the country’s most prestigious marching bands and renowned for their dynamic Southern Collegiate style, the Steppers are funded by the Brooklyn Music and Arts Program (BMAP) whose mission is to provide educational services to strengthen at-risk children’s academic capabilities, help build moral character, and musical and artistic ability. The Brooklyn Steppers marched in the 2009 Presidential Inauguration Parade in Washington, D.C. on January 20, 2009.

About Colson Whitehead
Colson Whitehead is the author of the novels The Intuitionist, John Henry Days, andApex Hides the Hurt. He has also written a book of essays about his hometown, The Colossus of New York, and is a recipient of a Whiting Writers’ Award and a MacArthur Fellowship. His new novel, Sag Harbor, was published this spring. Whitehead’s reviews, essays, and fiction have appeared in a number of publications, such as theNew York Times, the New Yorker, Harper’s, and Granta. A long-time resident of Fort Greene, Brooklyn, he penned the now infamous New York Times essay, “I Write in Brooklyn. Get Over It.,” about the booming Brooklyn literary scene.

About Leo Allen
Leo Allen is a comedian, writer, actor, and filmmaker who has performed stand–up comedy on “Late Night with Conan O’Brien,” “Last Call with Carson Daly,” NBC’s “Late Friday,” and his own “Comedy Central Presents” half-hour stand–up special, as well as at many national and international comedy festivals. He has written for “Saturday Night Live” and MTV’s “Human Giant” while appearing as an actor in “Sex and the City,” “Ed,” David Wain’s “Wainy Days” web series and as a guest star on Comedy Central’s “Michael & Michael Have Issues.” With Eric Slovin he comprises the comedy team “Slovin & Allen.” Allen is also an advisory board member for 826NYC, a Brooklyn–based, nonprofit writing center for local students and part-owner of the Black Rabbit Bar in his favorite part of North Brooklyn—Greenpoint.

2009 Conflux Festival’s new “Conflux City” program is accepting proposals – deadline July 20. From the website:

In keeping with its commitment to urban artistic exploration, community participation, shared knowledge, and critical civic engagement, Conflux will organize a user-generated open format event on Sunday September 20th, 2009 from 10am-6pm.

Through an open submissions process, ConfluxCity will provide a platform for artists, urban geographers, technologists and others to organize and produce innovative activities dedicated to the examination, celebration and (re)construction of everyday urban life.

Complete info at http://confluxfestival.org/2009/submit-a-project/.

Phote by Leigh Davis

Name: Timothy Braun
Title/Occupation: Writer/Professor.
Organization/Company: A handful of websites, theaters, papers, and universities.
URL: http://www.timothybraun.com

1. Where did you grow up and how did you end up where you are now?

I was born and raised in Indiana, but I’ve lived for stints in all kinds of places for months at a time doing residencies and fellowships. These places include Illinois, Ireland, Long Island, Maine, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Mexico, upstate New York, and Wyoming. After having a mailing address in New York City for a decade (I went there for graduate school) I moved to Austin, Texas. I’m a professor of English and Cultural Studies at St. Edward’s University. I travel to San Antonio (an hours south) on Tuesdays and Thursdays to lecture at the University of Texas at San Antonio.

I will be contributing to culturebot.org primarily on the arts of Austin. We have a fantastic theater scene here which includes the Rude Mechanicals, Rubber Rep, the Fusebox Festival, and Loaded Gun Theory, to name a few. Austin is also a haven for musicians featuring SXSW and the ACL Fest. The writer scene is tops, and the visual artists scene is emerging with sculptor Michael Krumenacker recently relocating to Austin. I also plan to contribute essays and interviews with people from all over, which I think the readers of culturebot.org will find interesting, such as my recent posts with artist Kambui Olujimi and poet Patrick Rosal.

2. Which performance, song, play, movie, painting or other work of art had the biggest influence on you and why?
It starts and ends with Kurt Vonnegut. The first book I read was Welcome To The Monkey House.

Vonnegut was important to me as a fellow Hoosier, but his work made me aware of meta-fiction and a use of melancholy imagination, two key elements in my plays. In my early 20’s I became enamored with the plays of Sam Shepard. Until I read Shepard I though theater had “rules”, but his use of sex and violence and rock ‘n role was rebellious from the theater I had known to that point. In the past five years I’ve come to love the humor and surrealism of Haruki Murakami to the point of where I have named a reoccurring character in my plays and even my new novel after him.

Murakami naturally leads to music, and although I listen to almost nothing but rock ‘n roll now, the most influential recording for my writing must be Mingus, Mingus, Mingus, Mingus, Mingus by Charles Mingus. This was the first CD I bought with my own money when I was fifteen. Mingus had a depth and structure to his songs like a Joseph Cornell box. Listening to Mingus was liking hearing a Cornell box. Now, more and more, visual arts spark my imagination. The photos of Jason Eskenazi and Josef Koudelka are self-contained stories. I love them. Adam Frelin is another artist I really like. I met Adam at the MacDowell Colony and he knocked me out with “White Line (Tokyo)”. His work is beautiful and uncompromising.

Wong Kar-Wai films have had a big impact on me. He makes the most haunting love stories. I constantly steal a scene from Fallen Angels in which a character fantasizes about her love to a Laurie Anderson song. I’m probably his only fan that likes 2046 more than In The Mood For Love. The story within a story of 2046, the story on the train, breaks my heart. Faye Wong is superb as the android in that story.

In theater Julien Mellan’s Mon Oeil at HERE Arts Center four years ago had an impact. Mellan crammed people into a small space, breaking fire code (I know because I was the fire marshal that night), and told an intimate story with nothing more than a sewing machine. David Herskovits did something called Tone Test a few years back at Lincoln Center that I can’t describe with words, but I can say it was brilliant. He used repetition as a form of structure. All Wear Bowlers was a big show for me. Geoff Sobelle and Trey Lyford (who was Adam Frelin’s roommate in graduate school) invaded the audience and made them part of the show, the way Vonnegut invades his readers and make them part of the story. I try that in my plays, and it is their fault.

3. What skill, talent or attribute do you most wish you had and why?

I’m bald, gap-toothed, and a little pudgy. I’m a remarkably ugly man. I often tell my students I look like Winnie The Pooh with down syndrome. To make matters worse I had spinal surgery in 2002, which dropped me to under 6 feet tall. Thus, I’m now short as well. I wouldn’t mind being easier to look at.

I’m also a very bad musician. I tried to play the saxophone in high school, but was terrible. I’m trying to learn Prince songs on the banjo right now, but only my dog likes my playing, Probably because I feed him. He’s obligated to like my banjo playing.

4. What do you do to make a living? Describe a normal day.

My day is extremely regimented. 4:30am I walk the dog. 5:00am is breakfast. 5:30am I respond to emails (I have 6 accounts now). Between 6:00am and noon it’s a combination of writing, teaching, grading, going over notes for lectures. Lunch is somewhere in this time. At noon I hit the dog run, or the lake, so Dusty (my dog) can go swimming. 1:00pm to 4:00pm it is back to the writing, teaching, grading, and going over notes for lectures. 4:00pm I go to the gym. I’m a little pudgy. I don’t want to be very pudgy. 5:00pm is dinner. 5:30pm is the after dinner dog walk. 6:00pm is when I start to cool down. I do some research in this time frame. 7:00pm is last night’s Jon Stewart. I’m usually in bed around 9:00pm. When I am at a residency I have a similar schedule, but without the dog.

5. Have you ever had to make a choice between work and art? What did you choose, why, and what was the outcome?
This question is subjective and I must answer “no”. I’ve worked at an ice cream store, tended bar, sold books, done a lot of things, but I’ve always viewed that jazz as research. All of those things have found a way into my writing. When I worked at HERE Arts Center, I viewed my position as a post-graduate fellowship, even though it was a straight-up job. A lot of newspapers will send me to do stories. I’ve learned to fly a plane, covered tattoo conventions, gun shows, alligator eating contests for papers and blogs. All of this is research.

Now I pay my rent by teaching, and much of my reading lists include A Brief History of Time, Fast Food Nation, and Guns, Germs and Steal. Since teaching these books the subject matters of physics, food, and migration have slipped into my plays and stories. Right now I’m reading Mirrors: The Story of Everything by Eduardo Galeano with the idea that I might add it as a textbook for one of my classes, but I can already see that this book is influencing my new play. For me, the difference between work and art is arbitrary.

****

You can follow Timothy Braun on his blog Federal Prisoner 30664, twitter, and facebook.

Bastille Day on 60th Street
Sunday, July 12, 2009
From 12 to 6pm
between Lexington and Fifth avenues

For more information visit www.bastilledaynyc.com

Bonjour New York!

On Sunday, July 12, 2009 from noon to 6pm everyone is invited to be French for a day. Experience the sights, sounds, and flavors of France right in your own backyard at New York’s “Street Fair with French Flair,” Bastille Day on 60th Street.

Quoi d’neuf?

New this year, Bastille Day on 60th Street will include a touch of luxury with a theme of “l’Art de Vivre a la Francaise”. Just relax and let yourself be pampered!

Mais oui

Bastille Day on 60th Street still includes all the popular favorites that thousands of visitors look forward to each summer: Sample the cuisine of France and other French-speaking countries, browse the French-themed market stalls, enjoy the music by our french-speaking artists, and dance in the street in our French-style “bal-musette.” Throughout the afternoon, live performers will be appearing on the festival-stage (between Madison and Park Avenues) —and oh-la-la, Can-Can dancers.

Allons enfants!

Don’t forget to bring the kids! Family-friendly fun abounds at Bastille Day on 60th Street. Sports-based activities with a French twist including soft pétanque, along with Arts & Crafts activities provided by the FIAF Language Center will all help burn off the extra calories from the delicious pommes-frites and authentic Belgian Waffles.

C’est parti!

Plan to spend the day. A French-style ‘open air picnic’ with tables adorned with checkered table cloths are set up along the three blocks of Bastille Day on 60th Street, so sit back and take the time to savor the delicious (and affordable) delicacies.

Bonne chance!

A raffle, with drawings for various prizes will be held throughout the day, with the Grand Prize of a pair of US-Paris round-trip tickets courtesy of American Airlines .

Vive la France!

Everyone is invited to come and share in the Bastille Day on 60th Street festivities and experience le joie de vivre à New York!

Andy Grotelueschen, Samantha Soule, and Robert Saietta (photo: Jim Baldassare)

Badass playwrights’ collective 13P is on to P#8, Lucy Thurber, whose brand-new MONSTROSITY opens at the Connelly Theater tonight. Lear deBessonet is directing, the cast is all-star, and I will personally hand you an icy cup of free lemonade. Do not miss this.

Tickets here.

More on 13P here.

MONSTROSITY

by Lucy Thurber (P#8)
directed by Lear deBessonet

A dark, epic tale of singing teenage fascists, magic, war, commerce, and love — a disturbing retelling of the hero’s tale with a girl as the hero and an unheroic ending.

Don’t miss 13P’s most ambitious production to date…

Running time: 2.5 hours.
Cast size: 21+
Performances: only 12.
Lemonade: free.

Sets  Peter Ksander
Costumes Emily Rebholz
Lights  Justin Townsend
Sound M.L. Dogg
Composer Broken Chord Collective

Featuring Carlo Albán*, Reyna De Courcy*, Frank De Julio*, J.D. Goldblatt*,
Andy Grotelueschen*, Pedro Guerrero, Ben Hollandsworth*, Alexander Lambie,
D.J. Mendel*,  Keeko Nakadai, Joseph Reyes, Natalia Roldan, Robert Saietta,
Samantha Soule*, Kristina Valada-Viars*, Michael Warner*, and The Teen Army

Production Stage Manager Winnie Y. Lok*
Movement Tracy Bersley
Fight Director David Anzuelo
Press Representative Jim Baldassare
Casting Director Kelly Gillespie
Associate Producer Rachel Karpf
Producer George Spelvin

*AEA

JULY 9 – 19, 2009
PERFORMANCE SCHEDULE
July 9-12, 14-18 at 7PM
July 11, 18, 19 at 1PM

The Connelly Theater
220 East 4th Street
Between Ave. A and B

All tickets $18

FOR TICKETS and MORE INFO
www.monstrositytheplay.com