PERFORMING ARTS “ SKYWATCHERS PERFORMANCE DATE: Sunday, October 6, 2013
TIME: 6:15PM “ 8:00PM
Tel: 415-580-1759
PERFORMANCE: Residents of the Senator Hotel with Anne Bluethenthal & Dancers, Nicole Klaymoon™s
Embodiment Project, Melanie DeMore, Stephanie Johnson, and Alejandro Acosta
Place: Tenderloin National Forest between the Senator Hotel
and the Luggage Store Gallery Annex
Address: 509 Ellis Street (near Leavenworth)
ABD PRODUCTIONS, the Luggage Store Gallery and Community Housing Partnership announce the SKYWATCHERS performance on Sunday October 6, 2013 in the Tenderloin National Forest. Developed by formerly homeless residents, professional dancers and sound and light artists, the performance is free to the public and specific to the Tenderloin neighborhood, reflecting the complex stories and life experiences within the community. Featuring residents of the Senator Hotel with Anne Bluethenthal & Dancers, Nicole Klaymoon™s Embodiment Project, original music by Melanie DeMore, sound design by Alejandro Acosta and lighting design by Stephanie Johnson.
SKYWATCHERS is a multi-disciplinary site-specific community performance project that makes visible the complex interaction of social, political and economic forces in San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood. Initiated in January 2012, choreographer Anne Bluethenthal meets regularly with formerly homeless Tenderloin residents housed by Community Housing Partnership (CHP). From the project™s inception the residents are co-creators, performers, and audience members alongside professional dancers and collaborators. SKYWATCHERS embodies the stories of community members by weaving together themes of survival, hope, grit, and determination expressed by residents”of œdew drop in tabernacle, œmenacing minds, and œthe right to free sleep. CHP residents relish this opportunity in which their stories and selves are central. This is the second in an ongoing series of performances developed at various sites throughout the Tenderloin.
ABD PRODUCTIONS / Anne Bluethenthal & Dancers is a women-
and queer-centered multi-ethnic company committed to inspiring social change through the arts and to the production of new dance works created in collaboration with diverse communities. ABD™s repertoire consists of over 100 original works, which have been presented in more than 200 public performances in the Bay Area and across the U.S. Our dances grow from deep investigations into the language of movement, using that vocabulary in eloquent, bold, and subversive acts of art. We endeavor to awaken our collective humanity by injecting the possibility of transformation and beauty into complex and challenging subjects, from globalization and genocide to global warming and gender fluidity. In SKYWATCHERS, ABD PRODUCTIONS takes its longtime commitment to community engagement to a new level of innovation and integration.
Artistic Director Anne Bluethenthal is a leader in the dance community fostering alliances and activism among artists. She has been widely recognized for her choreography including SF Chronicle’s Best of the Year, SF Weekly’s Black Box, and Bay Guardian’s Goldie Award for Achievement in Dance, among other honors. Bluethenthal is co-founder of the SF Lesbian and Gay Dance Festival, holds an MFA in Interdisciplinary Arts from New College of California, and is on the faculty of the MFA Creative Inquiry Program at the California Institute of Integral Studies.
Supported in part the Zellerbach Family Foundation, the Hewlett Foundation, Walter & Elise Haas Fund Cultural Commons Programs, and San Francisco Grants for the Arts Neighborhood Arts Collaborative.