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Austin360 blogs > Austin Arts: Seeing Things > Archives > 2009 > September > 10
Thursday, September 10, 2009
‘The Trash Project’ celebrates everyday labor as art
Choreographer Allison Orr has coaxed firefighters, dog walker, Elvis impersonators and Venetian gondoliers to be dancers. In the process, Orr has created not just spirited shows, but also poked at our pre-conceived notions of what kind of movement can be considered dance.
Now, the innovative Austin dancemaker transforms the movements and equipment of 25 workers from the city’s Solid Waste Services Department and 16 trash-collecting vehicles into a large-scale dance celebration of the physical labor most of us overlook.
‘The Trash Project’ will have its only show Saturday at 7:30 p.m. on the tarmac of the Austin Studios, 1901 E. 51st St. The show is free.
Read a full story about Orr’s project.
Watch a video here.
Orr tapped lighting designer Stephen Pruitt to wrap the performance in dramatic lighting. And composer Graham Reynolds has written an original score for the hour-long show. Reynolds used the recorded sounds of trash equipment in parts of the score. In other moments, it’s a piano trio with Reynolds on piano, Leah Zeger on violin and Hector Moreno on cello. The trio will be performing live Saturday night.
Listen to a rough cut of the music here:
‘The Trash Project.’
7:30 p.m. Saturday
Austin Studios tarmac, 1901 E. 51st St.
Free
www.forkliftdanceworks.org
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‘Mark-Making’ extended
Arguably one of the smartest gallery group exhibits to pop up this summer, ‘Mark-Making: Dots, Lines and Curves’ at Lora Reynolds Gallery will hang out a little longer as Austin’s art scene gets its autumn groove
The exhibit will now continue through Sept. 19. See www.lorareynolds.com for more info.
What distinguishes ‘Mark-Making’ is the breadth and depth that’s packed into this not-huge gallery.
For one thing, the show’s roster is frankly daunting: Noriko Ambe, Benjamin Butler, Graham Dolphin, Tara Donovan, Teresita Fernández, Dan Fischer, Ceal Floyer, Ewan Gibbs, Joseph Grigely, Mitzi Pederson, Ed Ruscha, Cordy Ryman, Fred Sandback, Kate Shepherd, Tony Smith, Robert Therrien, Jim Torok, Terry Winters and Daniel Zeller.
Phew.
But it’s the premise of this show that rewards repeated viewing. The primacy of the artist’s act is the concern of ‘Mark-Making.’ After all, in the beginning is the mark, the fundamental gesture that every artist performs. And, really shouldn’t we be getting back to basics now?
At the very least, it feels like a refreshing exercise to consider the basic action of art making. A pencil swipes a page. A knife cuts a stack of paper. A line of yarn graces a gallery wall and casts a shadow.
Take note of Ambe’s work in the exhibit, a diptych called ‘Cracking.’ The Japanese-born New York-based artist will have a solo exhibition at Lora Reynolds in November. With exacting precision, Ambe creates a sort of three-dimensional style of drawing by hand-cutting stacks of paper. For her upcoming show, Ambe slices and sculpts artists’ books. The result reads as a kind of three-dimensional topographical reconsideration of each book. And it’s brilliant and mesmerizing.
Image: Noriko Ambe. Cut on catalogues of “Attention to Detail - Curated by Chack Close” at Flag Art Foundation. www.norikoambe.com
Permalink | Comments (0) | Post your comment Categories: Visual arts
