Intent

As a continuation of my investigation of structured improvisation dictated by command systems and visual scores, Enter Comma Prepare [Our Construction] will be a performance installation for a home garage that uses three performers and an invited audience of roughly twenty people. I will combine several of the improvisation systems I have explored thus far and others that have not yet been tried. These will include the “clothesline/image”, the “table/object” and the “stick” animation that were trials from this semester as well as a computerized vocal command system previously developed.

Enter Comma Prepare [Our Construction] is a playful exploration of the situation of performance and examines how meaning is created in the encounter between performers and viewers. The piece toggles between the two simultaneous realities that occur in a performance situation – reality and fantasy - and intentionally encourages a heightened awareness of these realities for both performer and viewer. Enter Comma Prepare [Our Construction] examines the process of making “meaning” from performance by presenting numerous “accidental narratives”. The performers are propelled into action through computer-generated commands and audience-organized visual scores. Their improvised responses to these directives, in combination with the directives themselves, result in unexpected narrative relationships and scenarios.

While my investigation has components that when combined have implications, Enter Comma Prepare [Our Construction] and the entire series of Enter Comma Prepare events, is made from a flexible structure and not a pre-conceived end product. Enter Comma Prepare is a series of performance events with a structural score that is adjusted to each physical setting in which it occurs. All iterations of Enter Comma Prepare take inspiration from a specific architecture/site that when combined with the elements of the score result in related but different outcomes. The first iteration, Enter Comma Prepare [This Dinner] was made for a proscenium stage at Brown University (March 2011), the second iteration, Enter Comma Prepare [The Cave] was made for the lobby and main hall of Kaul Auditorium at Reed College (March 2012). Enter Comma Prepare [Our Construction] will be the third iteration to be presented in March 2013. Future iterations will be created in and for other performance spaces, traditional and not, to allow various architectures to impact the structure and define each articulation of the work. The space and the action within are equal partners that create an audience/performer experience and thus a resulting 'meaning'. Because the ECP series are created via suggestive improvisational structure and not the articulation of one specific idea, each viewer’s resulting sense of “meaning” is the real one and always has been.

I am not holding open auditions for this work but am instead asking two local dance artists to perform with me, Nancy Ellis and Tahni Holt. I will be connecting with them this week. I am not yet sure if I will have other artistic collaborators.

Most rehearsals will take place in my garage but some rehearsals may take place at Gracewood Studio in my neighborhood.

The rehearsal schedule will be a two-three hour block once a week throughout February and March.

This performance will mark the second in the Salon du Garage series. This performance will take place on Saturday, March 23, 2013.

I intend for this event to have an invited audience of roughly 20 people. I do not intend to widely publicize this event nor to request traditional review or critical response. I will invite a select few local Portland art world VIPs with whom I already have a friendly relationship. My intention is to let the word about the Salon du Garage series slowly leak out over time. To create an “insider” buzz that will draw its own attention.