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Event
FULL DISCLOSURE FESTIVAL
The Full Disclosure Festival is a new theater festival taking place in downtown Greenfield on June 19 and 20 in alternative venues all within walking distance. Different from the sister Double Take Fringe Festival, Full Disclosure is a festival of new theater pieces commissioned to share unique experiences to her audiences. Full Disclosure is four different offerings from four different artists: Lindel Hart, Amy Swisher, John Sheldon, and Joe Dulude II. Each show will run twice a night at 6 pm and 8 pm and audiences may choose to see one, or two each night, and all four if they come both nights. Each show runs between 60 and 90 minutes. Tickets also at Artsblock on the nights of the show. A single $20 ticket gets you into everything. When you purchase a ticket, if you want to participate in Amy Swisher's STORYLINE email lmciner@gmail.com for a slot. Her work is limited to 16 participants.
Said Linda McInerney, Artistic Director of Old Deerfield Productions, "We wanted to continue to promote downtown Greenfield as a creative destination and we also wanted to do something different from Double Take Fringe Fest. I have been thinking about how to involve audiences in new ways and to create a means for them to experience art for themselves, inviting them to become more engaged. In creativity studies, we learn that when people experience something in a new way, they have the opportunity to expand, enjoy, and embody the newness and be changed by it. I thought that would be a thrilling way to commission performance art. So I contacted four of our dear creative companions, Lindel, Joe, Amy, and John to see if they would take part. And they all said yes! Each is creating a unique piece that will connect with the audience in an exciting way."
AT GCTV @393 Main Street, Lindel Hart is creating a piece called, INTERVIEW that will take place at Greenfield Community Television at 393 Main Street. "In 1991 I saw Spalding Gray perform Interviewing the Audience on a public plaza in downtown Pittsburgh," Lindel recalls. "He pulled members of the audience onstage and conducted one-on-one intervews with each of them. Despite being in an open plaza in an urban setting, the work was intimate and revealing, both of the stories people offered and in the ways that Gray elicited them. That work has stayed with me all these years, and my desire is to approach the unearthing of stories from a different angle. By bringing the audience into a television studio, we enfold them in a more intimate, less intimidating space. Talk shows have always been popular and are almost always peopled by celebrities. Given the ongoing appeal of so-called 'reality television', I'm fascinated by the idea of standing at the crossroads of talk show and reality show, and interviewing real people as if they were celebrities. And yes, INTERVIEW will be videotaped in the TV studio and edited for eventual broadcast. INTERVIEW also feels a bit like experimental theatre to me: the audience as performer. It's a collaborative work that is completely unscripted and unpredictable. No two shows could ever be alike. It's an intimate conversation in front of an audience of strangers."
AT ARTSBLOCK ON THE CORNER OF MAIN AND BANK ROW, John Sheldon is doing a new piece about his life through music and Jules Verne's JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH at Artsblock on the corner of Main and Bank Row. John Sheldon was an 11 year old boy when he went to the movies and saw "Journey to the Center of the Earth", starring James Mason, Pat Boone, and Hedy Lamar. The movie wasn't that good, but the idea that there WAS a center of the earth captivated him.
As he grew older, the location of the center of the earth took on a different meaning. It wasn't the actual earth's core anymore, but the SPIRIT of the earth. A couple of years ago, he saw photographs of the Alberta Tar Sands, the forced extraction of oil, and the dead landscape it was creating. The devastation made a sound, as if the earth, being scraped, drilled, shot full of chemicals, was actually wailing out in pain, and nobody seemed to hear it. John tried to make that sound on his guitar. More sounds came, and the journey started picking up speed....
" I am weary. I am tired, and what I'm tired of is the constant barrage of evidence that we are ruining our planet. I can't engage with it without feeling depressed and helpless.
And so, I have decided to change it, and the change starts where it always has to: in me. I have a bag here, and in the bag are stories and songs that I have made or found which I use to reach out and make contact, not with aliens from outer space, but with spirits of the earth.
There is one about the crust of the earth, but also one about a redwood tree, one about a butterfly, a bee that lives in Africa, and a deer spirit who sees everything. There is one about a airplane made out of sound, one about the oil and coal in the ground, and one about a family of wolves.
If you can forget everything you think you know about our planet, just for an hour or so, and come along with me, we can explore this world, and love it back, the way it has loved us for so long and maybe, just maybe, it will hear us."
AT COMMUNITY YOGA AT 16 FEDERAL STREET, Amy Swisher is doing an evening of participatory improvisation limited to sixteen people per show that will have sign ups in advance called STORYLINE at Community Yoga on 16 Federal Street. Said Amy, "We all have stories to tell. And even the most mundane moments can take on fresh meaning when we play them out with others: amplifying the details, seeing things from up close and far away, adding the listener's perspective and interpretation. In Storyline, something as simple as standing in line at the grocery store may become an adventure in observation as we imagine the back story of the check-out clerk, or the origins of the crackers in our cart.
"Everyone improvises, life is improv from conversation, to finding our way after taking a wrong turn. The difference with Storyline is that we begin with a conscious commitment to say yes to ideas, to be fully in the moment, and to make the other players look good. Our stories may be funny, they may be poignant, and they may be surprising. We'll find out where they're going when we get there together.
"No previous improv experience is needed to participate in Storyline; no special clothes are required and no acrobatics will be involved. Just come prepared to play and discover. That's all. The rest will be determined by who shows up and which memories and present moments we choose to share."
AT HOPE AND OLIVE UPSTAIRS ON THE CORNER OF HOPE AND OLIVE STREETS, Joe Dulude II has written his very first play that will receive a production on the second floor of Hope and Olive called IN THE END that grapples with the LGBT experience of finding love and opening your heart. When asked what IN THE END means to him and what does he want the audience to experience, Joe replied, "In the End is at its heart a love story. It portrays the difficulty of finding and allowing love into your life as part of the LGBT community. Historically LGBT relationships have had to be hidden. Most members, especially gay men, have had to substitute love with brief encounters in back rooms or had to pretend to be room mates. I want this play to open up a discussion about our experiences in life as LGBT people and just people in general. Today with all the technology and apps at our fingertips, the art of conversation is being lost. We need to communicate our stories and our experiences with each other, and especially with a younger generation who may not know the struggle and prejudice we went through. Or perhaps if some of the younger generation is experiencing that prejudice, our stories and our solutions may help them in their lives. I hope the audience, straight or gay, can relate to the complications of finding that one love and the resistance of accepting that love into your life. I hope that they will leave the show willing to take a risk in their lives despite not knowing the outcome. Fear is a very powerful tool in our lives and we need to overcome the fear to truly live our lives and to find love in all forms. Lastly, I hope this show inspires other LGBT artists to relay their experiences in all forms of art painting, spoken word, music. We have such a rich community here in Western MA and I feel our voices should be heard."
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LocationArtsblock (View)
289 Main Street
Greenfield, MA 01301
United States
Categories
| Kid Friendly: Yes! |
| Non-Smoking: Yes! |
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