Fourth Annual “OnEdge” Series Spotlights Genre-Defying Experimental Live Performance

The Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events (DCASE) presents the fourth annual OnEdge, the experimental live performance series, February 23-March 25, 2016. The FREE admission series will feature Chicago and world premieres from national and International Artists and companies at venues including the Chicago Cultural Center (78 E. Washington St.), Dfbrl8r gallery (1463 W. Chicago Ave.), American Theater Company (1909 W. Byron St.), The Reva and David Logan Center for the Arts (915 E. 60th St.) and the Hamlin Park Fieldhouse (3035 N. Hoyne Ave.)

OnEdge performances include The Triumph of Fame by Marie-Caroline Hominal, A Ride On The Irish Cream by Erin Markey, minor matters by Ligia Lewis, The Three Matadores by Every house has a door, lil BLK by NIC Kay and Court/Garden by a canary torsi. Additionally during OnEdge, workshops and discussions will take place with select participating artists to complement their performances.

OnEdge is FREE and seating is available on a first-come, first-served basis 60 minutes before each performance. For a complete schedule, visit cityofchicago.org/dcase.

The Triumph of Fame by Marie-Caroline Hominal

February 23-25, 2017, 5-10 p.m. (one-on-one performances take place every 20 minutes)

Dfbrl8r, 1463 W. Chicago Ave., 773-609-1137

Swiss-based performer Marie-Caroline Hominal strips down the codes of theatrical artifice in a phantasmagorical and intimate one-on-one encounter with an audience member scheduled every 20 minutes. The Triumph of Fame is one of six poems by Petrarch title I Trionfi, which describe life through dueling virtues using the idea of triumph allegorically. In the poems, Fame triumphs over Death but is then defeated by Time and Eternity.

A Ride on The Irish Cream by Erin Markey

February 24 & 25, at 8 p.m.

American Theater Company, 1909 W. Byron St., 773-409-4125

A fresh and surprising new musical anchored inside the memory of a Michigan backyard on the bank of the Kawkawlin River, A Ride On The Irish Cream rushes forth from the mind of celebrated cabaret and performance artist Erin Markey. A live band and swath of carpet become the space for the thrills and terrors of a relationship between Reagan (Markey), a vainglorious self-made girl, and Irish Cream (Becca Blackwell), her family's pontoon boat/horse.

minor matter by Ligia Lewis

March 3 & 4, 2017, at 6 p.m.

Chicago Cultural Center, Dance Studio, 78 E. Washington St., 312-744-6630

Berlin-based choreographer Ligia Lewis uses dance, visual arts and the theater to pose questions concerning otherness and empathy in this second installment of a racially-conscious trilogy. Three performers build on minor aesthetics through a dynamic merger of the theater's parts; ultimately negotiating themselves in relation to visual and phonic play. In a time of anti-blackness, minor matter saturates the black box space with the elusiveness of black expression.

Three Matadores by Every house has a door

March 11, 2017, at 7 p.m. and March 12, 2017, at 2 p.m.

The Reva and David Logan Center for the Arts, 915 E. 60th St., 773-702-2787

The setting of a bullring offers a poetic meditation on identity, violence and the resonant beauty of language. Based on work by the esteemed American poet Jay Wright, The Three Matadores is the first staging of the micro-play that appears in his book-length poem The Presentable Art of Reading Absence (2008). Originally devised as solos by the four performers - Sebastián Calderón Bentin, Stephen Fiehn, Tim Kinsella, and Anna Martine Whitehead - the works introduce, respond to and contextualize the writing.

lil BLK by NIC Kay

March 16 & 17, 2017, at 7:30 p.m. and March 18, 2017, at 2p.m.

Hamlin Park Fieldhouse, 3035 N. Hoyne Ave., 312-742-7785

In an experimental solo performance influenced by New York City gay/queer ballroom culture, live punk shows, butoh and praise dance, lil BLKtells the autobiographical story of a fairy boi, child of god, little black girl, performer and activist. Through the exploration of form, performer NIC Kay wrestles with the societal constraints placed on the black feminine body and the traps of being a black performer searching for freedom on the stage...in a beat.

N.B. This performance takes place in the second floor theater of the building without an accessible elevator.

Court/Garden by a canary torsi

March 24 & 25, 2017, at 7:30 p.m.

Chicago Cultural Center, Preston Bradley Hall, 78 E. Washington St., 312-744-6630

A spectacle in three acts, Court/Garden is a multimedia, dance and live music performance taking its inspiration from the imperial ballets of Louis XIV's French Court and the participatory practices of the Occupy Wall Street Movement. Through operatic, spectacle-driven vocabulary, the work reflects on how we assemble and how our consumption and creation of images reflects our role as citizens. Like other works by a canary torsi, an anagram of choreographer Yanira Casto's name, audience actions impact the outcome of this experienced work.

Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events

The Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events (DCASE) is dedicated to enriching Chicago's artistic vitality and cultural vibrancy. This includes fostering the development of Chicago's non-profit arts sector, independent working artists and for-profit arts businesses; providing a framework to guide the City's future cultural and economic growth, via the 2012 Chicago Cultural Plan; marketing the City's cultural assets to a worldwide audience; and presenting high-quality, free and affordable cultural programs for residents and visitors.

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