performance art

I can't believe it's the end of my guest blog series already. Looking at he theme of art and feminism has raised loads of questions and also given lots of answers. We've explored artists who use hair and those who've experienced domestic violence, the woman who got a vaginal Damien Hirst tattoo, and the countless murdered and attacked females in Juarez, Mexico, who have been immortalized through the exhibition 400 Women. It's powerful stuff...

For me, art isn't just about finding something pretty or intelligent, or wishing I could paint as well as someone else. It's about looking at a piece and knowing that it's taught you something and you feel better for having seen it. You understand the world a little better afterwards, and you can't wait to rave about it to your friends. Here are three lessons I've learned from artists that I'd like to pass on:

If Frida Kahlo's painted figures and Marcel Dzama's illustrations were lifted off the canvas and brought to life in a seance performance, their stories and gestures would surely resemble the performative cabaret work of Geppetta. Philedelphia-based queer fabulist Adelaide Windsome is a multimedia puppeteer who explores mental health, identity and survival through the fantastic.

Tomorrow night in Portland (Thursday, February 17 at 7:00 PM), renowned artist Carolee Schneemann will give a free performance lecture at PCC's Performing Arts Center on the Sylvania Campus. A product of the 1960s-70's New York art scene, her work challenged, shocked, and forced her audience to think about their reaction to women's bodies and feelings about physicality, often with her own body as part of the composition.

 

It's festival season here in Portland, and MFNW was just the beginning. Running now thru September 19th, the Portland Institute of Contemporary Art is putting on its 8th annual Time-Based Art (TBA) festival. Here's your Bitch guide to women-centric performances and exhibitions over the next few days.

 

This is what reality television should be like. Made Here is a new web documentary series about work and life as a performance artist as told by a variety of artists living in New York City. Broken up into easily digestible video segments, the series goes beyond "Making It In The Big City" to explore the real-world challenges of space, family, and the impediments to creativity an artist faces.

I recently had the awareness-expanding pleasure of attending a Sister Spit performance (Michelle Tea, OMG)! In performance-mode were outstanding poets, writers, performance artists and basically super fantastic humans including: Silas Howard, Nicole J. Georges, Annie Danger, Len Plass and more more more!