The Vanderbilt Republic and The People Movers present The Middle Passage, a performance art narrative in site-specific camera obscura at Open Source Gallery.
January 21-22: Public preview
January 28: Elsa Waithe
February 4-5: Dante Brown | Warehouse Dance x Jayson Smith
February 11-12: Same as Sister (S.A.S.)
February 18-19: Dances for Solidarity x Chee Malabar
The Middle Passage is a performance art series curated by George Del Barrio and Kate Ladenheim using a focused camera obscura with multiple projections of the world outside the gallery to create surface-mapped stages upside-down and backwards on the gallery walls. For this project, the residential block outside of Open Source has been offered to local artists as a laboratory for a reinterpretation of the space and the landscape. The project aims to transform our shared spaces into a spectacle that allows the physics of the universe to bend in support of the artists.
During our day to day, we operate with a set of assumptions about property, space, race and gender; inside of the obscura, these rules are turned on their head. Artists of color are given the opportunity to present new versions of their work within an illuminated blackout that requires patience and observation for the viewer to fully discover. Within the blacked-out gallery, the artists will fill the space with their light, bringing site-specific to a darkened space as a subtle act of activism. Every day the theater will fade as the light dies, offering a metaphor for resilience. One act outside can be two inside; the artists in The Middle Passage will bring hope and light to dark spaces.
The Vanderbilt Republic (VR) is a creative agency based in Gowanus, Brooklyn. The agency was formed to catalyze the impact of creative expression in all modes. VR sees artists as leaders, activists and agents for positive change. Through their work with the creative diaspora, VR offers boutique solutions in: creative production, design, direction, artist representation and landscape projection design. George Del Barrio is VR’s founder and creative director.
The People Movers is a dance and production collaborative under the direction of Kate Ladenheim. It is the mission of The People Movers to create complex works that reveal the inherently performative qualities of our world through thoughtful and technical movement, and to support the arts community as a whole by organizing relevant and engaging productions. In short, The People Movers make performances, and make performances happen.
Advance admission tickets ($20) will be available at vanderbiltrepublic.com.