OCTOBER 1 - 4, 2020
DESIGN BY ALYSSA YEOMAN
FILM SERIES
LAND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT We begin by acknowledging this land is the ancestral home of the Duwamish and many other Indigenous peoples recorded and unrecorded, who have been the custodians of this land since time immemorial. As guests and — in many of our cases — as settlers on this land, we extend our deepest gratitude and respect to their ancestors and elders past, present, and future. On the Boards is beginning to engage in conversations to deepen our practices in a way that reflects and honors Coast Salish protocol. Part of our understanding of the protocol is making material gifts to the Indigenous peoples of this land as a way of recognizing their genealogical responsibility to the well-being of the territory and all beings who make a home here. We encourage you to donate online at realrentduwamish.org.
Founded by artists in 1978, On the Boards invests in leading contemporary performing artists near and far, and connects them to a diverse range of communities interested in forwardthinking art and ideas. We believe if we are successful in our work that we can grow our field, enrich peoples’ lives, and contribute to civic and global dialogues. We value: artistic risks while being fiscally responsible; leadership in our field and the multiple communities we serve to strategically advance the role contemporary artists play in society; racial and social equity, and accountability, to ensure our organization includes multiple viewpoints; provocative art as a vehicle to connect people of diverse backgrounds and perspectives; our local creative community as we engage with international artists and peers; and professional and transparent management.
ON THE BOARDS STAFF Betsey Brock, Executive Director Rachel Cook, Artistic Director Rich Bresnahan, Technical Director Sara Ann Davidson, Operations Manager Samie Detzer, Director of External Relations Katy Hannigan, General Manager Alexandra Harding, Assistant Technical Manager Clare Hatlo, Associate Producer Pamala Mijatov, Audience & Membership Engagement Manager Charles Smith, Curatorial Administrator Alyssa Yeoman, Communications and Digital Media Manager BOARD Davora Lindner, President John Hoedemaker, Vice President Ruth Keating Lockwood, Past President Emily Tanner-McLean, Treasurer Michaela Hutfles, Secretary Tyler Engle, Member at Large Tom Israel, Member at Large John Robinson, Member at Large Norie Sato, Member at Large Kristen Becker (on leave), Lara Behnert, Lorrie Scott Cardoso, Jeanie Chunn, Jeffrey Fracé, Corey Gutch, John Hoedemaker, Zack Hutson, Tina LaPadula, Mireya Lewin, Mari London, Jasmine Jamilah Mahmoud, Lance Neely, David Taft, Kate Murphy, Mary Ann Peters, Jennifer Hintz Roberts, Spafford Robbins, Jimmy Rogers, Robert Stumberger, Josef Vascovitz, Bill Way
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DRIVE-IN FILM SCREENINGS
ARTISTIC DIRECTOR NOTE We have been in the process of radically reimaging our artistic programs these past few months and rethinking everything. One of the ideas that came early on was using our parking lot as an art space—once it became clear that doing larger gatherings indoors was not going to be possible this year. We are lucky to have a parking lot across the street from our building and in recent years, that space has been transformed into a badminton court, a beer garden, and this weekend an outdoor drive-in movie theater! The creative re-imaging of space, programs, artistic engagement, and audience activity is at the heart of what On the Boards does as an arts organization. We are thrilled to present this four-night screening series that features a variety of artists, a wide range of film techniques, and diverse considerations about art and performance. Each evening has a stellar list of participating artists and the creative futures they are dreaming about. We are each living through this historic moment, and I continue to sense the shifting ground underneath us moving at rapid speed. As we are searching for new ways to gather, experience art, and build community, I am thrilled to invite you into the creative play space that once was our parking lot and will be many things over the course of this year. --Rachel Cook
Thursday, October 1 Wu Tsang Wildness (74 min, Spanish and English with dual subtitles) Shape of a Right Statement (5:15 min) Friday, October 2 Animation Night with Wa Na Wari and Northwest Film Forum Gabrielle Tesfaye (in collaboration with Wa Na Wari) My love Ethiopia (15 minutes) The Water Will Carry Us Home (7 minutes)
Clyde Peterson
Fluidity (Sassy Black) (1:58 minutes)
Neely Goniodsky (in collaboration with Northwest Film Forum) The Flame In Mother’s Mouth (2:08 minutes) Night Walk (3:23 minutes)
Danielle Dean
True Red (3:45 minutes) Hand drawn digital animation, excerpt from (TRT: 3:45) Sound by Acscending Sounds, Jamie Ford
Amanda Strong
How to Steal a Canoe (4:10 minutes) Mia' (8:09 minutes)
Saturday, October 3 Acting Stranger; Andrew Schneider, Minna Lee, Fox Whitney and LA Performance Practice Sunday, October 4 Sci-Fi Horror Night! With Black Cinema Collective
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CREDITS WILDNESS AND SHAPE OF A RIGHT STATEMENT CREDITS WILDNESS integrates elements of fiction and documentary structures to vividly portray Tsang’s multi-layered relationship with a Latino Los Angeles LGBT bar, the Silver Platter, one that explores her role as an artist and activist, and a member of a younger generation introducing itself into a gay scene that started before the Stonewall riots – the Silver Platter’s birth year is 1963. Shape of a Right Statement is a short work featuring Tsang’s recitation of one section of “In My Language,” a text by autism rights activist Amanda Baggs. Courtesy Electronic Arts Intermix (EAI), New York . Certified in Skinner Releasing Technique, she is a 2010-2016 Creative Campus Fellow at Wesleyan University where she engages students and professors in interdisciplinary practices, developing pedagogy in Dance, Archaeology, and Religious Studies. WILDNESS Directed and Produced by: Wu Tsang. Written by: Wu Tsang and Roya Rastegar. Produced by: Kathy Rivkin. Edited by: Claire Didier and Wu Tsang. Director of Photography: Michelle Lawler. Co-Producers: Daniel Eduvijes Carrera, Felix Endara. Original Music by: Nguzunguzu, Total Freedom, Robbie Williamson. (2012, 74 min, color, sound, HD video, Spanish and
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English with dual subtitles) With: Mariana Marroquin - as the VOICE OF THE SILVER PLATTER. Performers (In order of appearance): Zackary Drucker, Crazy Bitch in a Cave, Camlab, Geneva Jacuzzi, Stefan L. Smith, Amy Linton, We Are the World, Shunda K., Butchie & Fay, Tamechi, Dynasty Handbag, Lucky Dragons, Alex Black & Samuel White, Agassi Ben Gura, Mirror Mirror (with Veronica Celabaum & Ryan Trecartin), Roberto Ramone and The Modernaire, Fine Art Union, Foxy Moron, Iliana Snapper and Ron Athey, Geneva Washington, Leopold Nunan, Patrick (Sax Player).
Shape of a Right Statement- Filmed at the Silver Platter, the bar that previously housed Wu Tsang’s club party Wildness, Shape of a Right Statement is a short work featuring Tsang’s recitation of one section of “In My Language,” a text by autism rights activist Amanda Baggs. (2008, 5:15 min, color, sound, HD video) WU TSANG, is a filmmaker, visual artist, and performer who incorporates strategies of activism, art making, and stage production across a range of multi-disciplinary projects. While Tsang’s work has a rich visual style, her attention to shifting identities, transitional spaces, and communities emphasizes contingent identifiers such as language, voice, and persona, prompting inquiries into how
individuals and communities resist ingrained social prejudices. Using the frameworks of popular media forums such as cinema, television, theater and dance clubs, her work considers prescient debates about social gathering as a form of insurgency and the political capacity of contemporary art.
ANIMATION EVENING CREDITS In collaboration with Wa Na Wari & Northwest Film Forum, this evening screening includes short animation films about ancestral culture, self-portraits, cultural storytelling, and where the boundaries between objects break down and shape shift together to become something else. GABRIELLE TESFAYE (IN COLLABORATION WITH WA NA WARI) is an interdisciplinary artist versed in painting, animation, and interactive installation. Tesfaye is raised in the US as a first-generation, to an Ethiopian father and Jamaican mother. Her research is rooted in the African diaspora, ancient puppetry practices and cultural storytelling. Tesfaye obtained her BFA in Painting and Animation and Peck School of the Arts and MFA in Design at VCU Arts Qatar. Tesfaye has been internationally recognized in publications such as Majestic Disorder Magazine (UK) and Vogue (USA). Tesfaye has screened her work at BlackStar Film Festival, Reel Sisters of the Diaspora, CinemAfrica (Sweden), and Film Africa (London). She directed the highly acclaimed short film, The Water Will Carry Us Home, winning best experimental film at Reel Sisters of the Diaspora and Cream City Cinema College Filmmaker Award at Milwaukee International Film Festival. gabrielletesfaye.com,
@tesfayetra CLYDE PETERSON, is a transgender Northwest artist, working in film, animation, music, installation and fabulous spectacle. He is the director of Torrey Pines, an autobiographical stop-motion animated feature film and schizophrenia and queer teenage years. His award-winning work has been featured in museums, galleries, DIY spaces and film festivals around the world. Clyde founded and runs The Fellow Ship Artist Residency on Guemes Island, a free artist residency space for Queer and BIPOC people. He is currently working on two feature films, Even Hell has its Heroes and Our Forbidden Country. Learn more at ClydePetersen.com. @fuck_you_im_clyde_petersen FLUIDITY MUSIC BY SASSYBLACK, is a space age singer, songwriter & producer. This Goddess of electronic psychedelic soul & hologram funk explores the concepts of sound through deep compositions. Her dance party extravaganza, Sweet Vibes, was launched summer of 2018 in Brooklyn, NY to celebrate positive energy, good music and of course sweet vibes. On the Boards will be partnering with Sassy to bring Sweet Virtual Vibes to Twitch four times a year for your listening and dancing pleasure. NEELY GONIODSKY (IN COLLABORATION WITH NORTHWEST FILM FORUM) , has directed and animated over twenty-five short films including productions at the National Film Board of Canada, The New York Times, and Seattle University. She holds a master’s degree in Animation from Royal College of Arts, London, 7
and a bachelor’s degree in Animation from Concordia University, Montreal. Neely has been animating for over 15 years with her works reflecting an ever-ongoing search for new styles and expressions. Neely is interested in interpreting the human condition through abstract narrative and visual experimentation attempting to translate reality into visual poetry. She explores a combination of traditional animation techniques including ink and paint on paper, cut-out collage, under the camera animation, computer drawing, and 2D computer animation. Beyond animation, Neely’s works include video installations, paintings, drawings, and collage. neelygoniodsky.com @neelygoniodsky.
The Flame in Mother's Mouse Realisation/Animation Neely Goniodsky Poem by Dustin Pearson Sound Desing/Mix by Oliver Lewis
a loss. I do this by thinking about our relationship to objects—or, more specifically, to consumer products. I am interested in the cultures of circulation produced by objects and people in a global context. For example, advertising constructs the very idea of what it is to “be human.” Put another way, I am interested in how the subject is constructed in relation to capitalism—how our behavior, language, relationships, and personality are interpolated by things like advertising. I use fiction and the aesthetics of advertisement to engage and historicize the media and cultural processes that colonize the mind and body. Drawing on my own multinational background—born to a Nigerian father and an English mother in Alabama, and brought up in a working-class suburb of London—my work explores the ideological dimensions and material functions of technology, architecture, marketing techniques, and media as tools of subjection and oppression. http:// danielleadean.com
Composer Cabral Jacobs
Night Walk Realisation/Animation Neely Goniodsky Songwriter Benjamin Verdoes. Produced through Cue Northwest, Brick Lane Records and Northwest Film Forum.
DANIELLE DEAN, “I make work that explores the colonization of the mind and body through media and cultural production, engaging their relationship to capital accumulation. I am interested in how this process decenters ties to essentialisms and how this can be both a potential and 8
AMANDA STRONG is an Michif interdisciplinary artist with a focus on filmmaking, stop motion animations and media art. Currently based on unceded Coast Salish territories also known as Vancouver, BC, Canada. Strong received a BAA in Interpretative Illustration and a Diploma in Applied Photography from the Sheridan Institute. With a cross-discipline focus, common themes of her work are reclamation of Indigenous histories, lineage, language and culture. Strong is the Owner/Director/Producer of Spotted Fawn Productions Inc. (SFP). Under her direction, SFP utilizes a multilayered approach and unconventional methods that are centered in
collaboration on all aspects of their work.
ACTING STRANGER / Minna Lee, Andrew Schneider, and Fox Whitney Concept / Andrew Schneider
BRACKEN HANUSE CORLETT is a multimedia artist hailing from the Wuikinuxv and Klahoose Nations. He got his start in theatre and performance and has since transitioned into a focus on digital-media, live-visual installation/performance and visual arts. He is the co-founder of the Vancouver Indigenous Media Arts Festival and over the last four years he has performed across the country as a member of the audio-visual collective, Skookum Sound System. He is a graduate of the En’owkin Centre of Indigenous Art and the Emily Carr University of Art and Design, and has studied Northwest Coast art, carving and design. Mia’ is his first film.
ACTING STRANGER CREDITS Andrew Schneider and Seattle-based artists Minna Lee andFox Whitney have been collaboratively dreaming up the reboot of Acting Stranger, a multi-layered art work, to help us collectively navigate reconnection with each other; in slow stages, from the drudgery of another video-conference call to a future full embrace with a complete stranger. Each iteration of Acting Stranger thrives on being authored within the world’s current moment, its freedoms, restrictions, debates, hardships, resilience, and humanity. Acting Stranger helps us track and understand how we meet each other across time and space as we re-connect, grieve our losses, and re-imagine community. www. actingstranger.com; @act_stranger
Writing and performance / Minna Lee, Andrew Schneider, and Fox Whitney Dramaturg / Raelle Myrick Hodges Sound / Bobby McElver Video / Andrew Schneider Produced with Miranda Wright / Los Angeles Performance Practice ANDREW SCHNEIDER,is an OBIE award-winning, Drama Desk nominated performer, writer, and interactive- electronics artist creating original works for theater, dance, sound, video, and installation since 2003. “I am interested in how curating meaningful time-based experiences can lead to more meaningful humanto-human interaction. If theater at its core is humans telling stories about ourselves to each other, then I hope it is in the service of getting better at being human.” Based in Brooklyn, New York, Schneider creates and performs original performance works, builds interactive electronic art works and installations, and was a Wooster Group company member from 2007-2014. In March of 2020 Andrew premiered the choreographic work »remains« commissioned by the Sasha Waltz & Guests company at Radialsystem in Berlin, Germany. Andrew’s original performance work in NYC includes NERVOUS/ SYSTEM (2018 – BAM Next Wave Festival) AFTER (2018 – Under the Radar Festival,The PublicTheater) YOUARENOWHERE (2015 OBIE award – The Invisible Dog, 2016 Drama Desk nom – 3LD); DANCE/ FIELD (2014 – Dance Roulette), TIDAL (2013 – River to River festival); 9
and WOW+FLUTTER (2010 – The Chocolate Factory Theater) among others. He is a recipient of the Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists award (2020). http:// andrewjs.com/ RAELLE MYRICK-HODGES was named as the first creative director of 651 Arts, has served as artistic director of San Francisco’s Brava for Women in the Arts and was the inaugural curator of Performing Arts for the Contemporary Arts Center New Orleans.As a nationally-known stage director, Myrick-Hodges has worked in over 15 regional theaters and museums including SF MOMA, Playmakers Repertory, California Shakespeare Theater, The Public Theater, The National Black Theater, Theater Minnot in Beirut and EDELO Residencia in Chiapas, Mexico. MINNA LEE, is a Hmong-Vietnamese American writer, theatre artist, and musician based in Seattle. They serve as Marketing Coordinator at Theatre Off Jackson and as an Ensemble Member at Washington Ensemble Theatre. You can experience Annex Theatre's audio production of their play One Horse Town at https:// youtu.be/ysH8NEgTp3I. Please support the Black Trans Travel Fund with their work in providing safe transportation to Black Trans Women by sending funds to their Cashapp: $BlackTransTravelFund, Venmo: @ BlackTransTravelFund, and PayPal: paypal.me/BlackTransTravelFund. FOX WHITNEY is the architect/ choreographer of Gender Tender, an interdisciplinary performance project that centers his queer black mixed
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transgender point of view. He creates experiences that investigate the nature of queer relationships, trans histories and the surreal nature of transformation. Gender Tender engages a team of artists trained in Fox’s unique methods modeled on cults, sitcoms and riots. Fox is a 2020 artist in residence at On the Boards in Seattle Washington. He was selected as the 2018 artist in residence at Velocity Dance Center. His performance work has been commissioned and produced by On the Board’s NW New Works Festival and Solo Festival; Velocity’s Next Fest NW and Seattle Festival of Dance Improvisation; the Seattle International Dance Festival; Yellow Fish Epic Durational Performance Festival and was selected for the inaugural season of Seattle’s Gay CIty Arts. His short dance films have screened at CounterPulse in San Francisco, at Seattle’s Twist Film Festival, Translations: Seattle’s Transgender Film Festival and at Next Dance Cinema presented by Velocity and Northwest Film Forum. www. gendertender.weebly.com MIRANDA WRIGHT/ LOS ANGELES PERFORMANCE SPACE (Producer) actively generates systems of support for the creation of new performance by artists whose work advances our understanding of the rapidly evolving world around us. As creative producers, we are devoted to the production and presentation of groundbreaking experinces that use innovative approaches to collaboration, technology, and social engagement. As a service organization, we create opportunities for artists to develop their projects and professional practices. As relentless advocates for live performance, we engage in field-wide
research and special initiatives that deepen our collective understanding of the implicit value of art in our culture. Anchored in Los Angeles, our projects and programs have national and global reach. www.performancepractice.la
SCI-FI HORROR CREDITS BLACK CINEMA COLLECTIVE will surprise you with an entertaining evening of BIPOC SciFi/Horror films and guest appearances. The Collective closely engages Black films through screenings, watch parties, and discussions with local and global filmmakers from African and Afro-Diasporic communities. @blackcinemacollective
DRIVE-IN PARTNER ORGANIZATION CREDITS WA NA WARI creates space for Black ownership, possibility, and belonging through art, historic preservation, and connection. Wa Na Wari means "Our Home" in Kalabari. Co-founder, Inye Wokoma, is Kalabari through his father's lineage. The name Wa Na Wari evokes a sense of purpose and intention to remain present in a place we consider home. Wa Na Wari was founded in April, 2019, in direct response to community conversations convened by Wa Na Wari’s four co-founders, between 2017 and 2019. Wa Na Wari is founded by Inye Wokoma and Elisheba Johnson, Black artists directly impacted by Seattle’s displacement and affordability crisis; and Jill Freidberg and Rachel Kessler, white artists using art and stories to challenge white supremacy, especially as it is expressed through gentrification and displacement. www.wanawari.org NORTHWEST FILM FORUM Founded
in Seattle in 1995 as an independent film and arts nonprofit, Northwest Film Forum incites public dialogue and creative action through collective cinematic experiences. Each year the Forum presents hundreds of films, festivals, community events, multidisciplinary performances, and public discussions. As a comprehensive visual media organization, the Forum offers educational workshops and artist services for film and media makers at all stages of their development. nwfilmforum.org THE BLACK CINEMA COLLECTIVE is a Seattle-based group of artists and scholars who examine and celebrate works of African and African diasporic filmmakers through programmed screenings and community discussions. With both a Black Feminist and Black Global lens, we hold space for the complex existence and storytelling inventions of Diasporans. We consider intersectional histories and topical stories by supporting multiple forms of filmmaking from local and global artists, activists, documentarians, and organizers. Through our focused events on Black film and visual productions, we exercise agency and care as custodians and students of a broader spectrum of Afro-Diasporic cultures. @blackcinemacollective THE UPTOWN ARTS AND CULTURE COALITION is Seattle’s member-led non-profit organization for advancing the arts in Uptown. We strengthen and support an important network of people—artists and arts professionals, cultural organizations, businesses, neighborhood residents, civic leaders and policymakers —all working to increase the participation in and evolution of arts and culture in the Uptown neighborhood and across Seattle. www. uacc.art
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