Honey Pot Performance

Friday September 23 7-9pm
Experimental Station
6100 S. Blackstone Ave 60637-2912

Registration is required. Reserve here— http://bit.ly/nI5ElW

From The Color Purple to Precious to The Help, what’s missing in representations of Black women in popular culture today? In Ladies Ring Shout–a performance using a combination of spoken word, movement and original soundtrack–Felicia Holman, Abra Johnson and Meida McNeal explore portrayals of women of color in popular culture and offer their own poignant and personal stories of resistance in this three-woman show. “There’s potency within this range,” says TimeOut Magazine. “It’s as if the trio’s work is fundamentally a tug-of-war between emotional and intellectual investigation.” Join us for this special multi-media performance and conversation.

Sponsored by The Public Square, a program of the Illinois Humanities Council, this event is free and open to the public. Co-sponsored by Chicago Foundation for Women’s African American Leadership Council and U Chicago’s Center for the Study of Race, Culture and Politics.

We invite you to come out and share this intimate production with us. Check out our The Ladies Ring Shout project website. You’ll find all kinds of goodies including a couple of podcast interviews, some sneak peeks into the space as we loaded in last night, and a wonderful preview review from gender and women’s studies scholar Kulvinder Arora.

Pre-sale tickets available online!
The Ladies Ring Shout
August 4-6 2011 / 8p at Defibrillator, 1136 N. Milwaukee
$10 online | $15 at the door

Buy tickets!

Find us on Facebook!

Check out our project website for The Ladies Ring Shout. We’ll be posting updates in July as we prepare to debut this labor of love. We are excited to share this work with you!

Among my other projects, I have been busy co-curating an interdisciplinary festival all about the value of creativity and creative labor with my good friend and longtime creative associate Abra Johnson.

Come out Friday and Saturday to Links Hall for the performances.  Then join us Sunday afternoon for a FREE community spectacle and panel discussion on the value of creativity in Logan Square.

TO ART & PROFIT:
Creative Labor, Collective Action & Conscientious Capitalism

Interdisciplinary performance series
arts-focused dialogues & street spectacles

Curated by Links Hall Artistic Associates
Abra Johnson & Meida McNeal

**MARCH 18-20**
What Is It Good For? Defining Art’s Purpose Now

Collaborating Artists:
Cristal Sabbagh & Roger Noel
J’Sun Howard & Jennifer Karmin with insight by Coya Paz
C.C. Carter, Sage Morgan Hubbard & Keli Stewart

PERFORMANCES
8pm Fridays & Saturdays
at Links Hall, 3435 N.Sheffield

$10/Students, $12 General Admission, Group Rates Available

COMMUNITY SPECTACLE & DISCUSSION
Sunday March 20 in Logan Square

NEXT WEEK!
FESTIVAL FUNDRAISER

8pm-12am Friday, March 25th

Suggested Donation $10

at Defibrillator, 1136 N.Milwaukee

Some months back, a friend of mine wrote a concerned note about this year’s soca hit ‘Palance’ which stormed Trinidad Carnival 2010. The tune ended up with the coveted Road March title. Written and performed by two local radio DJs JW & Blaze, ‘Palance’ sparked an up-in-arms reaction by some hardcore Trinidadian soca lovers.

How could two radio DJs who aren’t even soca musicians set the musical tone of the Carnival season? The song was a warning sign of a new (and perhaps unwelcome) guard emerging in contemporary soca style and production. This mediated influence of the people’s festival might be placing the future of Carnival music dangerously under the power of radio (in US terms, we might think the case of Clear Channel’s domination of our popular play lists feeding the music to the people rather than the people letting radio know what they want to hear…but then, this has been the case in the US for quite some time and why so many choose alternative stations to get independent radio). For many of Trinidad’s concerned cultural citizens ‘Palance’ made one pause to consider soca music’s next evolution. Could this be the coming of a less democratic Carnival?

But some might counter that these two DJs bold seizure of the Road March title is the highest indication of cultural democracy’s preservation. Speaking on behalf of the duo, JW’s reaction to their musical coup sounds like a grassroots – up from the people – one: “We have won the hearts of the people and I am very grateful. I think the people took ‘Palance’ to the next level. It was a fantastic victory and what made it even more fantastic was that it was a victory for the people because when the results were announced, there was not a sad face in the whole venue, everybody was happy, it was pure celebration” (See Newsday). The bacchanal JW & Blaze caused with the song and in fete circles lay at the heart of Carnival consciousness where everyman/woman has a voice and a chance to compete, to prove his/her mettle before the people.  If this ent Carnival freedom what is?

But this debate is also not new. During my first Trinidad Carnival experience in 1996 there was an outcry about the death of soca as people then knew it.  ‘Move it to the Left’ was cast as a puppeteering of the masses through mindless directed movement. ‘Lotayla’ and ‘Chutney Bacchanal’ heralded the rise of chutney soca, a new musical hybrid on the Carnival music market. And Krosfyah’s string of hot tunes, leading what was to be termed the Bajan Invasion, were a dominant part of the soundtrack to my first season of wining, fete and madness. All of these minor evolutions in Carnival music upset its established narrative as an Afro-Creole local-national party music.

I am fascinated with this dilemma because I see how this most recent musical cultural incident is both freeing and un-freeing, how it signals battle lines drawn between an old guard and a new one, and how it brings to bear the persistent question of tradition v. change – a debate that rears its head in the changing tides of any cultural performance history. The manifestation of the cultural battle is an indication that a form is deeply foundational to the experience of a community. The fierceness to claim a certain kind of soca and the loyalty to protect the genre by old-school soca devotees is a display of love. But it is also a display of gatekeeping.

As I read local Trini news articles on this musical/cultural controversy, the debate felt familiar.  I could link it to an ongoing issue I’ve been trying to work through as I analyze my own Chicago cultural roots. I am a child of disco & house. It is the music that most colors my sense of myself from my adolescent years to the present. It is the music my sister introduced me to that also brought in my introductions to sex & sensuality, to liquor, desire and other big kid games. It was my point of entry to a certain kind of blackness that I didn’t have access to growing up on the Northside, but also of an openness (at least in musical aesthetic and rhetoric) that made my bi-racial identity much easier to manage at that age. So for me it is more than just music, it is an exquisite expression of who I am as a Chicago-born citizen and everything that I love and hate about this city.  It is in this music and dance culture that, as Trinis would say, I bury my navel string.

I know there are many like me, house lovers known by their ability to identify anthems, places, DJs and who can tell some part of the historical narrative of house as an organizing social force in the urban space of Chicago. Within this fold, there is a sense of secrecy and exclusivity in order to make sure the folks who truly “love” house are present.  This brand of Chicago house is for those who want a club experience that is about music, about dancing and about spirit not what you’re wearing or who you are with.  This is love. For those who know the rites of jackin and wailing and hands in the air and …is it all over my face…

House has come to be more than music, but the representation of a way to think and be. It is a humanistic philosophy about living openly, flexibly, honestly and lovingly in the world. And it does all this through music, movement and the embodied fellowship of like-minded folk on dance floors, around bangin’ mixes and through life-affirming memories of sweat, bass, percussion and funk/blues drenched vocals.  Because I love Chicago house, I want to see it comprehensively researched and disseminated as the urban folk cultural phenomenon that it is. This is the only way I think we can protect its complex history. This is also the only way we can responsibly let it go.

More and more I see a dividing line between older generations of house lovers and newer ones that looks a lot like the dividing line between generations of soca lovers. A recent thread discussion on Facebook by a Chicago house DJ erupted in a scroll of posts debating whether what younger DJs and club kids were listening to could be termed authentic Chicago house. Here was love & gatekeeping making a strong territorial mark.

I understand that newbies to house & disco might not know its history as a resistant cultural politic for marginalized folks of color, class and alternative sexualities.  I understand that while they may get house’s sensibility of sensual and spiritual freedom, they may not understand where that sensibility comes from.  Truly, if house wants to live in the 21^st century it will have to adapt to and incorporate the interests of our rising generations. But, while I firmly believe that every cultural form shifts to meet the conditions of its current time, I also believe that foundations and roots matter too.  The kids need to be schooled to know that Chicago house derives from a legacy of African American cultural politics. Chicago house is chain gang, blues, gospel, jazz, funk, bop, disco at its root.  It continues the tradition of speaking pain, speaking resistance and catalyzing healing through music and dance.

And yet…and yet when I think about house music in the city of Chicago and the keepers of the guard, the civic pride of genuine househeads, I have to consider more closely the contours of this cultural love. Is love selfish? Is love selfless? Is love about opening up or is love about setting limits?  Depending on where you stand, what you’re talking about and to whom, love like culture has a changing face.  And like culture too, love is definitely a battlefield.

The danger of democracy is that it can breed shitty or dumbed down art & culture, but the alterative scenario of an elitist gate keeping guard deciding what “is” art & culture and what is not, what “is” tradition, national, us, them, etc. is far more painful (and diabolical) to bear. So I guess us house lovers will have to contend with the new kids claiming the music but not necessarily knowing the roots. We will just have to work harder to document and educate to make sure our narrative is still on the table. And I guess old school soca lovers will have to contend with new variations in Carnival music.  The older heads will just have to remain watchful helping Carnival’s aesthetics of spirit, freedom and bacchanal stay as unruly as ever.

CHICAGO DANCEMAKERS FORUM ANNOUNCES 2010 LAB ARTIST GRANTS

Chicago Dancemakers Forum announces the grant recipients of the 2010 CDF Lab Artist Program, with four awards of $15,000 plus 12 months of professional development support for choreographers Rachel Bunting, Rachel Damon, Meida Teresa McNeal and Erica Mott.  The Chicago Dancemakers Forum (CDF) is a catalyst for innovation and a means to increase dynamic interaction among Chicago’s dancemakers.

CDF is the only artistic programming forum of its kind dedicated to nurturing artistic advancement for new dance development in Chicago. Launched in 2003, CDF serves the ongoing need to support the research and development of new directions in dance. The program is designed to cultivate artistic exploration and growth by funding dance artists in their creative process.  CDF also hosts workshops, work-in-progress feedback sessions, and critical forums and discussions for the broader Chicago dance community. CDF is led by a consortium composed of two independent dance artists, the Museum of Contemporary Art, The Dance Center of Columbia College Chicago, and Links Hall.

Ginger Farley, a former grantee and current consortium member proclaimed: “CDF offers a deep validation for artistic process and experimentation; it’s more than just money.”  Lab Artists are offered broad support for in-depth research and development periods leading to the production of a new dance work of their own. These three distinct phases of dedicated research, development, and production, are key elements to the CDF program. The support system includes regular discussions with consortium members, visiting artists, and the other grantees, in order to advance and stimulate their artistry. As a result, this program has created uniquely strong relationships for Chicago choreographers.

The four 2010 Lab Artists have been identified for their outstanding creative vision. Each artist has identified a unique path of creative investigation leading to a new public project.

Rachel Bunting is an independent dancer, choreographer, and artistic director of The Humans. For her CDF project, Bunting will create Paper Shoes, immersing herself in nostalgic processes to create a series of vignettes, rooted in the aesthetics of a contemporary fairytale. Bunting will explore connected themes of rites of passage, memory, and sexuality, by way of image, metaphor and object.

Rachel Damon is a multi-media artist, dancer, and artistic director of Synapse Arts Collective. Damon’s project, Factor Ricochet: Embodying the Gender Spectrum (working title) is a dance study of gender expression as exhibited by the human body, taking into account personal experiences and scholarly research. Damon will investigate the body and voice as a soloist and in cooperation with others to travel the spectrum of gender options.

Meida Teresa McNeal is a choreographer, ethnographer and performance scholar who uses the medium of dance to tell stories about communities. Her proposed piece is The Sweetgoddess Project, which explores the movement principles and aesthetic ideas of Chicago house music and dance culture through the experiences of women of color. The Sweetgoddess Project places women squarely at the forefront of this often male dominated form, embracing the presence of femininity, community, sensuality, pleasure and empowerment as integrated components of Chicago house culture.

Erica Mott is a choreographer, dance theater maker, and puppeteer whose work is particularly informed by observation of specific environments. Mott will create Dancing Forms, an evening length performance emerging from a deep investigation into and application of object manipulation, puppetry, and principles of energetic presence to create new and integrated dance choreography. Dancing Forms will include collaborations between Mott and internationally celebrated artists Sara Shelton Mann, Clare Dolan and Royal De Luxe.

Past CDF grant recipients are: in 2009, Julia Rae Antonick, Lin Hixson, Kevin Iega Jeff, Atalee Judy; 2008, Jan Bartoszek, Peter Carpenter, Jonathan Meyer, Nadia Oussenko; in 2007, Matthew Hollis, Ayako Kato, Nicole LeGette, Julia Mayer, in 2006, Darrell Jones, Michelle Kranicke, Margaret Morris, Molly Shanahan; in 2005, Asimina Chremos, Margi Cole, Carrie Hanson, Julia Rhoads; in 2004, Lane Alexander, Shirley Mordine, Hema Rajagopalan, Eduardo Vilaro; and in 2003, Ginger Farley, Jimmy Payne, Jr., Sheldon B. Smith, Erica Wilson-Perkins.

Public Programming: CDF also conducts a series of public workshops and roundtable discussions to invigorate and benefit the broader Chicago dance community, including informal works-in-progress showings, artistic development workshops, and critical forums and discussions. Engaging and educating audiences, and each other, on how to discuss, understand, and critique movement work is at the core of CDF’s mission. Programs are led by visiting artists, cultural organizers, and local artists and scholars. CDF public programs are open to the general public, as well as interested Chicago artists, and are offered for free or at an affordable cost.

During spring 2010, CDF is extending its ongoing partnership with Silverspace Studio to produce CDF/Silverspace Salons, a free, informal series of salon-style artist talks with local and national dance artists committed to pushing their creative approach forward. Typically held on the first Monday of every month, each conversation focuses on an invited artist’s process in making movement-based work. The next CDF/Silverspace Salon features a conversation with interdisciplinary artists Mark Jeffrey and Judd Morrissey, discussing the build process for The Precession, a performance, installation, and digital poem inspired by New Deal-era architecture which will premiere at the Hyde Park Art Center in December, 2010. This event is scheduled for Monday, March 22,from 7:00-9:00pm at Silverspace Studio, 1474 N. Milwaukee Ave., in Chicago.

For more information about the new 2010 Lab Artists, the current 2009 Lab Artists who will be completing their projects in the coming months, and workshops and the monthly discussions series Silverspace Salons, go to www.chicagodancemakers.org, or contact Heather Hartley, CDF Project Director at 773-891-4785 or chicagodancemakers@gmail.com.

The Chicago Dancemakers Forum is supported by the Alphawood Foundation, the Weasel Fund, The MacArthur Fund for Arts and Culture at The Richard H. Driehaus Foundation, the Chicago Seminar on Dance and Performance, and a number of generous individuals.

#  #  #

–

heather hartley
project director
chicago dancemakers forum
www.chicagodancemakers.org

The Chicago Dancemakers Forum (CDF) supports the creative growth of Chicago dance artists, funding the research and development process for new projects, and hosting workshops and discussions for the broader Chicago dance community. Learn more at www.chicagodancemakers.org.