RACHEL FEINSTEIN: THE LAST DAYS OF FOLLY
Press Release
RACHEL FEINSTEIN
"THE LAST DAYS OF FOLLY"
Marianne Boesky Gallery and Madison Square Park Conservancy present a one day only performance festival, Rachel Feinstein's "The Last Days of Folly", on September 3rd, 2014 at 5:30 p.m. at Madison Square Park.
MY BARBARIAN
My Barbarian will present Broke Baroque Suite, an original operetta discussing topics of economics and art. The performers collaborate in chorus and solo numbers, including an aria by a soprano titled “I, Object,” a baritone/tenor duet called “The Artisan’s Lament,” and “The Five Seasons,” a dance-song. The audience will be involved in an improvisational incarnation of fortune- and future-telling.
ALLISON BRAINARD and CARA CHAN
Referencing Commedia dell’arte styles, Allison Brainard will choreograph a group of seven performers acting as harlequins. The performers will lead a raucous procession, travelling around the perimeter of the park and playfully moving park goers through the performance sites. They will enact simple improvised scores with each other, forming static tableaus and interacting with several instruments and sculptural elements created by Cara Chan.
JARVIS COCKER
Inspired by Maurice Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloé for the Ballets Russes, Jarvis Cocker will create a musical interlude that will serve as a segue between the performances on the stage at Feinstein’s Cliff House.
SOFIA COPPOLA
Sofia Coppola will orchestrate a dance performance in response to the backdrop of Feinstein’s Cliff House. Coppola’s performance will feature six young Joffrey Ballet ballerinas on pointe. The ballerinas will dance to Isao Tomita’s electronic version of a Claude Debussy Arabesque.
TAMAR ETTUN
Tamar Ettun will stage a performance piece incorporating five colorful, simultaneously occurring sculptural and sound events. Six “movers” will attempt to accomplish durational physical tasks while negotiating Feinstein’s outdoor sculptures, inflatable handmade balloons, and one another. Using a system of traditional rituals paired with postmodern dance concepts and gestures, the piece reflects on the human body in relation to deconstruction and stillness.
LITTLE DID PRODUCTIONS
As Feinstein’s Folly brings European architecture from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to Madison Square Park, Little Did Productions will bring fourth-century BCE India to Folly with verses from the Ramayana, a Hindu epic. Incorporating colorful overhead projections with found images from Indian shadow puppet theater, Little Did’s narrator and co-artistic director, Luke Santy, in collaboration with Jessica Lorence, will lend sitar and vocal accompaniment to images projected onto Feinstein’s Rococo Hut.
LIL BUCK with PAUL CANTELON and WOLFRAM KOESSEL
Lil Buck is a Los Angeles-based street performer who specializes in jookin’. He will perform two improvised dances in front of Feinstein’s Cliff House, accompanied by Paul Cantelon on piano and Wolfram Koessel on cello.
KALUP LINZY with MIKE JACKSON
Romantic Loner One Life To Heal is a visual musical melodrama of torch songs performed live by Kalup Linzy as characters Kaye Braswell and Taiwan Braswell, Kaye’s presumed-dead cousin. Both are members of the fictitious Queen Rose family, who feature in Linzy’s soap opera video series Conversations Wit De Churen, Melody Set Me Free, and As Da Art World Might Turns. The compositions are taken from Linzy’s musical visual projects Sweetberry Sonnet and Romantic Loner, released in 2008 and 2013, respectively. The performance will also include portions of 2013's Conversations Wit De Churen X: One Life To Heal and will include live musical accompaniment by Mike Jackson.
MOLLY LOWE
Sensuality meets the grotesque in Molly Lowe’s performance beneath Feinstein’s Flying Ship. Relating the sense of touch and impressions of space, performers will don one large costume made of many nude suits sewn together, forming an undulating blob.
ANGELA MCCLUSKEY and PAUL CANTELON
Singer/composer duo Angela McCluskey and Paul Cantelon will present a series of musical performances from their extensive archive. In addition, they will perform a new original score inspired by Feinstein’s Folly.
SHANA MOULTON
Shana Moulton will present a site-specific performance during which she will interact with imagery projected onto Feinstein’s Rococo Hut. Treating a series of mundane objects as puppets, Moulton’s performance will fill the proscenium window of the sculpture. Live singing will accompany the actions.
TONY OURSLER and CONSTANCE DEJONG
Inspired by his childhood sailing along the Hudson River, along with his admiration of the Hudson River School of American painters, Tony Oursler, in collaboration with Constance DeJong, will present a new video projection of an animated fantasy on Feinstein’s Flying Ship.
CARLOS VELA-PRADO
Within the context of the historical “folly” premise, Carlos Vela-Prado will install inconspicuous sculptures and wireless speakers throughout Madison Square Park. They will emit soft-spoken voices, contributing to a soundscape that combines 1950s love songs, Fellini soundtracks, and traditional baroque strings with ambient and contemporary music. Vela-Prado’s audio selections will be restructured and mixed such as to confuse the individual parts while extending and incorporating each other into a textured ballad for Feinstein’s sculptures and the evening’s audience.
DESIGNERS
Giles Deacon will create a new dress for Rachel Feinstein to wear throughout her Last Days of Folly performance festival. The dress will be inspired by Marie Antoinette and Folly, Feinstein’s exhibition at Madison Square Park.
Duro Olowu will display a runway piece from his Spring 2008 collection. His model will travel throughout the park over the course of the evening.
Zac Posen will use the park’s Oval Lawn as a performative runway. Posen will incorporate between ten and fifteen of his David’s Bridal wedding gowns into an animated showcase using both live models and puppeteers.
Narciso Rodriguez will create costumes for The Last Days of Folly performers Tamar Ettun and the Moving Company.
Cynthia Rowley will create a “fountain dress” for a model to wear in the reflecting pool at the north end of Madison Square Park.
Inspired by Gelsomina, the ingénue of Federico Fellini’s La Strada, Proenza Schouler will create costumes for three clownish performers who will entertain park goers throughout the festival.
Madeline Weinrib will adorn the stage area in front of Feinstein’s Cliff House with a tableau of carpets inspired by a range of global cultures.
