BARE// TEETH
I rushed out of my office an hour early on December 16th, 2011 to catch the 5:15 bus to Philadelphia from NYC to see BARE// TEETH that evening at 9pm.
It was quite an elaborate evening of installation performances of poetry, theater, movement as well as dance. I believe I walked into the spirit center of the performance art world in Philadelphia. Most of the folks I would want to connect with were all on stage, including a dear friend Indee Mitchel who I met two years prior at an Urban Bush Women Summer Leadership Institute in New Orleans. On the top floor of what appeared to be an abandoned unfinished warehouse with unfinished wood plank floors, we waited on line and slowly proceeded up the stairs. Some of the performers on duty for crowd control were discussing the safety of having such a large crowd in what seems like a partly unstable structure. In the end, it seemed all parties were let upstairs, and I hoped that the balance of bodies spread across the entire floor would level out what felt like loose floorboards from collapsing underneath our feet.
The evening began with a welcome from none other than the Indee Mitchel. The floor was packed. After checking my coat and suitcase at the front behind the bar and complimentary homemade goodies, it took me a good few minutes to make it midway the crowd to meet my friends. Funny enough, the first installation took place exactly 180 degrees from the direction the crowd was pointed from start. With impressive original scores on a variety of instruments as well as vocals, we witness a puppet show with poetry conceived by Briel Driscoll, called three daemon serenade (into the cupboard). I notice Alea Pierro, Hampshire College Theater Alum in the background assisting with props. To no surprise I believed she would be the one assisting, as I read a monologue for her Division Three (senior thesis) puppetry show about sexual trauma and survival.
BARE// TEETH was described by the originators as: about::
memories, histories, habits, visions and futures stored in our bodies, traditions of resistance, and celebration of survival and change...
Second up, we saw work by the FRACTAL Collective directed and created by Lily Hughes in collaboration with i n d e e, Neena Pathak, D.DeVore & Althea Baird. The group presented a series of performance works based in choreography and text, the first of which is called Survival Orchestra. The artist’s program notes states: ‘Survival Orchestra recalls the memories of resistance stored in our bodies and celebrates small and large acts of survival in our everyday lives.’ The work definitely demonstrated the essence of a work of ensemble creation, with various subtexts and actions occurring between various performers simultaneously at different points in space.
With a remarkable poem about gender queer identity, followed by a monologue about surviving relationship abuse, to an incredible dance solo I was flored by the energy the graced the space. And we all celebrated with a dance party to rejoice at the achievements of the performers. I definitely hope to catch i n d e e ‘s solo work she plans to bring on tour in January. I hope to write more about that soon.
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