ICH, KUBISGEIST, THERE THERE Included in PS122's Fall 2012 Season

For more than three decades, Performance Space 122 (PS122) has served as a hub for contemporary performance, commissioning and presenting artists who have radicalized theatrical forms, triggered national political and ethical debates, and made waves on Broadway and beyond. As the institution’s longtime East Village home undergoes renovations, PS122 is thriving in new ways, partnering with peer organizations across New York City and choosing venues best suited to their programming, instead of the other way around. This fall, PS122 continues along this path, co-presenting with the French Institute Alliance Française (FIAF)’s Crossing the Line 2012 festival and The Chocolate Factory in Long Island City.

PS122’s fall season opens with provocateur David Levine whose durational performance installation HABIT features three actors performing a 90-minute drama on a continuous loop for eight hours a day. Using a commissioned script by playwright Jason Grote, HABIT takes place within a four-walled, fully furnished and functional American ranch house designed by Marsha Ginsberg and built inside a raw, unused space in the Essex Street Market on the Lower East Side.

Big Dance Theater’s ICH, KUBISGEIST installs their signature blend of performance, text, and visual design into The Chocolate Factory’s cryptic basement. Written by Sibyl Kempson, directed by Paul Lazar and co-directed and choreographed by Annie-B Parson, the work is a strangely comedic and raw contemplation of language. Ich, Kürbisgeist is set in a harsh quasi-medieval landscape facing destruction, populated by a community speaking a rigorous, specific, and completely invented language.

PS122’s fall season culminates with THERE THERE, from playwright and performer Kristen Kosmas and director Paul Willis. There There is a bilingual performance duet inspired by the completely unsympathetic and deeply disturbing character Vassily Vasilyevich Solyony, from Anton Chekhov’s THREE SISTERS. Performed by Kosmas and a soon-to-be-announced Russian-speaking actor, THERE THERE is a radical, yet strangely moving, reimagining of everyone's favorite Chekhovian sociopath.

Vallejo Gantner, artistic director of PS122, describes the season as "a journey from disaffected urban to rural surreal, and a trip through language (Russian, English, and completely invented), time (from one hour to eight), and place (a ranch-house in a warehouse, a pumpkin patch in a basement, the Russian countryside in Long Island City). Together, these three works create a series of juxtapositions, questions and incongruous happenings that promise to utterly transform."

Tickets to ICH, KUBISGEIST, THERE THERE, and the Season Launch Party go on sale to the general public on August 1. All tickets may be purchased online at chocolatefactorytheater.org and via phone at 212-352-3101. David Levine’s HABIT is free and open to the public. Please visit www.ps122.org for more information about PS122’S Season Launch Party and the entire fall 2012 season.

PERFORMANCE SPACE 122 FALL 2012 SEASON

12-13 Season Launch Party
Gawker Media Rooftop, 210 Elizabeth St. between Prince & Spring St. in SoHo
Wednesday, September 5, 2012 at 6:30pm
$30 in advance / $35 at the door (All tickets include open bar & hors d’oeuvres)

From start to finish the evening’s social convergence of artists, PS122 staff, and friends will be infused by singular performative and non-performative events of the unexpected, absurd, and often coy nature curated and featuring Get Modern on Me aka GMOM aka Neal Medlyn, Adrienne Truscott, and friends.

Performance Space 122 (PS122) provides incomparable experiences for audiences by presenting and commissioning artists whose work challenges boundaries of live performance. PS122 is dedicated to supporting the creative risks taken by artists from diverse genres, cultures and perspectives. We are an innovative local, national and international leader in contemporary performance.

Beginning in 2011, PS122 embarked on one of the most unusual and potentially radical shifts in its history, including a re-structuring of artist support, a business model overhaul, and the renovation of our building. As PS122’s East Village home undergoes a much-needed interior renovation supported primarily by the City of New York, DCA and DDC, PS122’s core activity continues to be providing audiences with contemporary live performance.

For over 3 decades, Performance Space 122 has been a hub for contemporary performance and an active member of the cultural community in N.Y.C. and across the globe. In 1980, the organization was founded by Charles Moulton, Charles Dennis, Tim Miller and Peter Rose to offer artists rehearsal and performance opportunities in the revamped cafeteria of a former New York City public school (PS 122) at the corner of First Avenue and Ninth Street in New York’s East Village. In 1986, under the artistic direction of Mark Russell, the organization doubled its programming by converting the gymnasium on the first floor of the school building into a second performance space. Over the past 30 Years, PS122 has brought forward not only artists, like John Leguizamo, Jonathan Ames, Eric Bogosian, the Blue Man Group or Annie Dorsen who have gone on to make waves in commercial arenas on Broadway or at HBO, but also artists who have triggered national debate about political and ethical issues, like the original “NEA four”, Ethyl Eichelberger (HIV/AIDS activist), or more recently Young Jean Lee and Branden Jacobs-Jenkins (contemporary social critiques), as well as artists who have radicalized aesthetic form like Meredith Monk, Spalding Gray, Ron Athey, Richard Maxwell, Elevator Repair Service, Radiohole, Adrienne Truscott, Verdensteatret (Norway), Rabih Mroué (Lebanon), Philippe Quesne (France), and Maria Hassabi (Cyprus).

Under the curatorial vision of Vallejo Gantner (artistic director 2005 – present) PS122 has developed a set of programs designed to re-establish the value of live performance, provide singular experiences for audiences that inspire critical thinking, and sustain the creative process for artists throughout their career. In addition to the commissioning and presenting of artists from N.Y.C., across the US, and around the globe, PS122 has increased our activity off the stage to provide audiences with a variety of access points and context for the work. These activities include both talkbacks with the artists as well as conversations that bring together luminaries from non-arts disciplines. Topics have included everything from religion, to migration, to queer real estate. PS122 encourages the asking of questions and debate of contemporary society’s issues in both artistic practice and audience experience.

For more information, log on to ps122.org.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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