Are you going to sweat on my face, again?, 2007
Are you going to sweat on my face, again?
November 17, 2007
Performance by Holly Faurot & Sarah H. Paulson
NYCAMS (New York Center for Art & Media Studies), New York
3-hour performance with music by Joel Mellin
PRESS RELEASE:
NYCAMS (New York Center for Art & Media Studies) will present Are you going to sweat on my face, again?, a one-night-only performance by Holly Faurot & Sarah H. Paulson. This new work marks the institution of the Sequence System, an automatic cycling of multiple video components used to choreograph the breakdown of time and movement within a non-linear performance installation. This system is a development of the Surveillance System, a physical network of bodies controlling one another through movement, video, improvisation, and sound.
Eight performers are stationed along the periphery of the gallery. Some performers sit awkwardly in what seem to be backwards chairs, while others take cues from videos and one another. The videos displayed on three LCD monitors generate subtle movements that gain emphasis from the performers' partially exposed bodies. Meanwhile, the artists periodically pass through the audience and retreat to a freestanding pink neon-lit room in the center of the space.
A multi-channel video device cycles through a series of four videos, two of which are live feeds. The first pre-recorded video component consists of edited footage of fire, which the artists shot in May 2007 in Yanartas, Turkey, a place where natural clusters of fire burn constantly on the side of a mountain. Yanartas is located five miles from Olympos, Turkey and has also been known as Mount Chimaera. Another pre-recorded component features a seated man on an industrial rooftop. His intense focus and partially hidden arm movements hint at interactions taking place off-camera.
Are you going to sweat on my face, again? is executed by ten performers, including the artists, and features sound by Joel Mellin, an experimental computer music composer who writes software using JMSL (Java Music Specification Language). The performance is presented in the round. The audience is invited to walk alongside the performance and experience the work from multiple vantage points. Viewers may enter and exit at any time throughout the three-hour work. Optional seating is provided.
Clothing: Linda Fitzgerald
Performers: Jessica Cook, Holly Faurot, Kaitie Fitzgerald, Molly Fitzgerald, Onnie Mancino, Troy Ogilvie, Sarah H. Paulson, Susie Paulson, Emily Poole, Sarah Aphrodite Stolwijk
Chairs: Paul Loebach
Video Appearance: Daniel Bainbridge
Neon: Lite Brite Neon
