WPA Announces Schedule Change; Will Present COOPED by Jamar Roberts Tonight

Works & Process, the performing arts series at the Guggenheim, believes in the transformative power of art. Tonight they will now highlight Cooped by Jamar Roberts, a Works & Process Artists #WPAVirtualCommission that premiered on May 24.

Artist Note by Jamar Roberts:

This work was inspired by the release of recent statistics showing the disproportionate amount of black and brown bodies being affected by the Covid-19 crisis. In this work I set out to create an imaginatively potent fever dream that aims to capture the fear of sickness, and the anxiety of quarantine as it relates to the historical trauma of black bodies being relegated to live in and within confined spaces. Being asked to self-quarantine while politically quarantined presents a crisis within a crisis, leaving these communities the most exposed and vulnerable to the effects of the pandemic.

For hundreds of years, the black body has been a great source of controversy since its arrival on American soil. Systems of oppression embedded in American society has always cast mental, emotional and physical violence in and on the black body. I wanted to use my own body to bring visibility to an entire community of people that often go unheard and in some cases unseen. This display of the dancing black body not only peers into the psyche of marginalized people in a very specific crisis, but it is also a testament to their strength, beauty and resilience.

Tonight's originally planned premiere will now take place on June 20:

Click Clock-Tick Tock

by Anthony Roth Costanzo, Dick Hyman, Adam Charlap Hyman, and Zack Winokur

Works & Process Artists (WPA) Virtual Commissions, a direct response to the pandemic, was launched to financially support artists and nurture their creative process during these challenging times. Works & Process, the performing arts series at the Guggenheim, is granting more than $150,000 in commissioning funds to artists who have been or were supposed to be featured at Works & Process. Artists from a wide variety of genres have been commissioned to create new works, less than 5 minutes long, while social distancing, that will premiere on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube (@worksandprocess) every Sunday and Monday at 7:30pm and can be viewed anytime after.

WPA Virtual Commissions Playlist

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6On3OKBegI&list=PLJ08rQmWB63RFC3avQF-nDsneUXLrUd4X

Works & Process Artists (WPA) Virtual Commissions(as of June 1)

Stella Abrera * Evita Arce * Ephrat Asherie * Brandon Stirling Baker * LaTasha Barnes * Reid Bartelme * Joshua Bergasse * Hope Boykin * Brian Brooks * Nora Brown * Tony Buck * Nathan Bugh * Rena Butler * Donald Byrd * Chris Celiz * Alejandro Cerrudo * Gaby Cook * Anthony Roth Costanzo * Dylan Crossman * Adrian Danchig-Waring * Machine Dazzle * Viva DeConcini * Simone Dinnerstein Michelle Dorrance * Silas Farley * Jack Ferver * Tom Gold * Joseph Gordon * John Heginbotham * HIPS * Adam Charlap Hyman * Dick Hyman * Michael R. Jackson * Jeremy Jacob * Colin Jacobsen * Michael Jagger * John Jarboe * Harriet Jung * Larry Keigwin * Gabrielle Lamb * Ashley Laracey Pontus Lidberg * Ana Lopez * Dave Malloy * Missy Mazzoli * Ryan McNamara * Sara Mearns Andrea Miller * Isaac Mizrahi * Nico Muhly * Carson Murphy * Michael Novak * Josh Prince * Caili Quan * Sascha Radetsky * Jamar Roberts * Anthony Rodriguez * Kamala Sankaram * Zoe Sarnak * Penny Saunders * Claudia Schreier * Troy Schumacher * Margo Seibert * Dan Siegler * Dawn Sinkowski * Gus Solomons jr. * Ethan Stiefel * Karma Stylz * Pam Tanowitz * Conrad Tao * Caleb Teicher * Adam Tendler * Richard Thomas * Charles Turner * Nicholas Van Young * Preeti Vasudevan * Eyal Vilner * David Watson * Omari Wiles * Zack Winokur * Nicole Wolcott

Works & Process Artists (WPA) Virtual Commissions has been supported by Stuart Coleman, Antonio Convit and Tim McGRaw, Lucy Dobrin, Adam Flatto, Bart Friedman, Bond Koga, Jayne Lipman, Cynthia Hazen Polsky, Stephen Kroll Reidy, Denise Saul, Annalyn Swan, Shelby White and many others. Virtual video design support for WPA Virtual Commissions provided by Anupam and Rajika Puri. New music for dance for WPA Virtual Commissions provided by The Charles and Joan Gross Family Foundation.

To post a comment, you must register and login.