20180724

Participated in the Performance Philosophy Reading Group organised by the Center for Performance Research. We read Work(s) and (Non)Production in Contemporary Movement Practices (2016) by Hetty Blades and discussed it with a small group. The event was hosted by Antonio Ramos, a dancer who works an artist director of a group called The Gangbangers. The text was very complicated, it attempted to define separate components of movement based praxis, which make up a dance (art)works and to examine how these components relate to labor (is rehearsal work?, is documentation work?, is performance work? etc.). The text attempted to make a clinical dissection of dance (art)works but it got tangled in loose definitions. Due to the complexity of the text, discussions were unfocused.

Rode at the Kensington stables today. My horse was called Bingo and I got to use a Western Saddle. The trip was fun, slow but fun. A passing bicycle spat on the ground as a protest. It was cool to see horse statues from the back of a horse. Also got some insight to inner-city horse politics. I learned about the New York State Horse Council.

ISCP discovered the Parks Enforcement Patrol that might develop into something. I applied to be a Parks Enforcement Patrol Mounted Auxiliary volunteer.

Participated to the Artists at Work: Modupeola Fadugba and Yen-Ting Hsu talks at ISCP. Hsu took us on a audio journey trough rural Korean villages (got to hear the rhythm of a tatam-mat knitting machine), the trip ended on a ride on the L-train to underline the course of modern development (I talked about SOW with her after the performance). Fadugba presented a series of paintings which depict synchronized swimmers. It was interesting to think about swimming from a collective/shared bodybuilding perspective and to learn about the The Harlem Honey and Bears synchronized swimming team. The event felt rigidly scripted.

20180712

Participating in the ISCP weekly Open Doors Thursday. The beginning of the day was busy. I got to meet nice people but I got tired pretty fast. I retreated into my studio and started to log/quasi-edit Signal #6 (Cifas) footage which was shot by by Camille Laufer in 2017. Here is a raw cut of the Trans-Horse Parade and some footage form Care & Control workshops.

My visit to Staten Island (on Monday) felt like a beating, I’m still recovering. Busses were late, I was late, it was hot and I was so sweaty I couldn’t hold my camera rig steady. I didn’t have stamina to direct the interview I shot. The footage is almost good, better then I feared (More on that later). Bought a Rode RodeLink Wireless microphone system which worked well (Learning how to balance the audio will take a while).

Discovered Kensington Stables at Prospect Park. 45$ for an hour with a horse – Not bad! I learned from the news that there are a drastic development plans for the area and the local urban horse culture is under thread. I guess I’ll go to a riding class next week.

Why the Ed Sheeran lawsuit makes no sense (2018) Adam Neely. A very convincing video, arguing that some copyright lawsuits benefit lawyers (who work for corporations), at the expense of artists (who work for music).