La MaMa Will Conclude 59th Season With A FEW DEEP BREATHS

For the final online experiment in La MaMa's 59th season, seven writers (Erik Ehn, Huntrezz Janos, Adrienne Kennedy, Haruna Lee, Chuck Mee, Robert Patrick, and Christopher Rivas), two performers, and an online audience come together for A FEW DEEP BREATHS, premiering Friday, June 25 at 8pm ET and serving as a poetic reflection of this critical moment in our shared history and a meditation on the road ahead, it has been announced by Mia Yoo, Artistic Director of the Tony Award-winning La MaMa ETC, and Billy Clark, Artistic Director of CultureHub, the theatre's innovative art and technology center, which recently marked its 10th anniversary.

A FEW DEEP BREATHS creates an opportunity for multiple voices, disciplines, and approaches to converge. Each of the writers worked independently to generate dialogue and/or actions for two performers, one playing a 7-year-old and the other a 77-year-old. The non-linear tale that emerges is developed in collaboration with creative technologists, embodied by performance artist Agosto Machado and puppet artist Tom Lee, and will explore interactivity and connection with the online audience.

A FEW DEEP BREATHS stars the legendary actor Agosto Machado, who has been at the forefront of avant-garde since the 1960's with other trailblazers such as Candy Darling, Jackie Curtis, Ellen Stewart, Holly Woodlawn, John Vaccaro and Ethyl Eichelberger. Mr. Machado, who was a key figure in the first Gay Pride March in New York in 1970, describes himself as "an orphan with a sixth grade education, and a degree from the university of the streets." He grew up in Hell's Kitchen, until the development of Lincoln Center forced out working class families, and settled in Greenwich Village where he "fell into the most magnificent, wonderful ALICE IN WONDERLAND world of downtown."

According to Ms. Yoo, A FEW DEEP BREATHS "Posed the seven writers with questions about the human spirit and its essence, its god-like qualities. Also, what do we need to be asking as individuals and a global community right now, and how do artists respond at a time like this? Their combined aesthetic will be unique, certainly, and bracing."

A FEW DEEP BREATHS is developed within CultureHub and La MaMa's "Experiments in Digital Storytelling," which incubates story-driven artworks that harness digital distribution platforms, expand online audience engagement, and push the boundaries of current artistic forms.

CultureHub was launched in 2009 by La MaMa and the Seoul Institute of the Arts in Korea to establish a more sustainable model for international exchange and creativity in the 21st century, in effect, continuing La MaMa's reputation as a world leader in experimental arts dating to the 60's when the late Ellen Stewart created La MaMa in NYC's East Village.

While it connects artists worldwide on nearly all continents, CultureHub has dedicated facilities in New York, Los Angeles, Korea, Italy and Indonesia. Among its programs is DOWNTOWN VARIETY, an original series begun at the onset of the pandemic in March 2020, devoted to new works created during lockdown by performance artists internationally.

As with DOWNTOWN VARIETY, A FEW DEEP BREATHS is developed using LiveLab, CultureHub's browser-based media-router for collaborative performance, along with other interactive online platforms.

A FEW DEEP BREATHS concludes La MaMa's 59th season, which presented a staggering variety of live-streamed work, including the hit LAST GASP by Split Britches, THEATER IN QUARANTINE, LA MAMA MOVES Dance Festival, and over 20 DOWNTOWN VARIETY programs with short works by a veritable Who's Who of experimental theatre artists.

For more information and to view A FEW DEEP BREATHS, visit www.lamama.org. The new online work is free (donation suggested).

To post a comment, you must register and login.