Welcome to TBA:22 Welcome to TBA:22 Welcome to TBA:22 Welcome to TBA:22
Cover: San Cha, photography by Samanta Helou Hernandez. This spread: Sylvan Oswald, photography by Sarah Annie Navarrete
Anniversary 20th Anniversary 20th Anniversary 20th Anniversary 20th Anniversary Welcome to TBA:22 Welcome to TBA:22 Welcome to TBA:22 Welcome to TBA:22
Whether this is your first TBA or your twentieth, showing up now takes everything we’ve got. Yet it also gives, moves, disrupts, replenishes, restores. This TBA, we promise you will feel something from all that you witness.
A festival is not just an event. A festival asks for a particular kind of attention and intention. A festival tells us we are present for something active, unfolding, not yet knowable. A festival invites a collective experience and generous spirit, fueled by the now, and by living artists making work in response to our world and our times (no matter how broken the world or how dark the times).
In reality, the future of festivals, the future of everything, is uncertain. In light of it all, we move forward. Despite it all, artists persist. We are awed by this year’s TBA artists who have taken risks and defied odds to make, to travel, to perform, to give.
We are told all we have is each other, and we are told all we have is this moment. So we invite you to be here now—with and for the art, and with and for each other.
Put simply, thank you artists for creating. Thank you audiences for coming. Thank you staff for the heavy lifting. Thank you everyone for believing in this experiment. See you at the festival!
With love, Roya Amirsoleymani
Artistic Director & Curator of Public Engagement Erin Boberg Doughton Artistic Director & Curator of Performance Kristan KennedyArtistic Director & Curator of Visual Art
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PICA acknowledges that Portland is on the traditional homelands of the Multnomah, Oregon City Tumwater, Walata, Wasco, Kathlamet, Cowlitz, Clackamas, Bands of Chinook, Tualatin Kalapuya, Molalla, and many other Indigenous peoples both recorded and unrecorded. People from these lands were relocated to the Grand Ronde Reservation under the Kalapuya etc., 1855 ratified treaty (also known as the Willamette Valley Treaty) and are now part of the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde. The Grand Ronde people maintain a connection to their ancestral homelands and continue their traditional cultural practices. Our region’s Indigenous community now includes people from over 380 Tribes both local and distant. PICA respectfully offers this acknowledgment as a small step on a path towards recognition and repair, with the understanding that acknowledgment is not a substitute for action.
TBA:22 illuminates what is new and extraordinary. It wrestles with the unanswered and unanswerable. It pushes against this edge of what it means to make—and who can participate in—contemporary art. In addition to performances, exhibitions, dance parties, our new NIGHT SCHOOL program, and our Fall 2022 Creative Exchange Lab, come hang out, sip, ponder, and re/connect between and after programs at our on-site Festival bar. TBA:22 will feature international, national, and regional artists, World and West Coast Premieres, local partners, and accessible sites and spaces across the city. This September, we invite you to come together—in the twenty-year spirit of TBA—to experience a festival like no other. For a deeper dive into each program, please visit pica.org/tba.
Welcome to PICA’s twentieth annual Time-Based Art Festival!
This Festival was founded to bring artists and audiences together—to think about art and ideas, to witness the art of our time, to mark time with living artists, to feel alive in this place and at this specific time.
DATE Sept. 8 at 8:00 PM
LOCATION PICA, 15 NE Hancock Street
TICKET Off pass: Suggested donation of $0–$20, reservations required. Donations made on Opening Night will be matched dollar for dollar, doubling your impact on PICA’s programming and access to contemporary art.
RUN TIME 60 min CAPACITY 300
Los Angeles, California
Celebrate the start of TBA:22 at our Opening Night with a headlining performance by renowned Los Angeles-based musician San Cha. This visual and musical performance will highlight original compositions and interpretations of Mexican mariachi and bolero standards in San Cha’s signature style that blends and queers a multitude of forms while showcasing her captivating costumes and stunning stage presence. The party doesn’t stop there; San Cha’s kick-off performance will be followed by a DJ set by multidisciplinary artist Lapaushi (of Portland’s Noche Libre, a Latine femme DJ collective). Gather at PICA with artists, curators, guest scholars, and new friends and old to embrace the Festival. With indoor and outdoor spaces, make a night of it with our on-site bar, limited-edition merch, and late-summer dance party vibes. Opening Night of TBA is where it all begins—don’t miss out!
San Cha is the product of Lizette Gutierrez who reimagined herself as a queer, multi-genre singer by subverting the tropes of popular culture from her Mexican roots as a first-generation daughter of Mexican immigrants. San Cha has managed to make an impact on the music world, thanks to a highly original sound that encapsulates who she is. After making the Bay Area scene for a few years, she took a break and lived on her aunt’s farm in the Mexican town of Jalostotitlán where she reimagined herself as a queer ranchera singer, subverting the form of that genre as well as telenovelas and other signifiers of Mexican and Latinx culture. Red Bull invited her to appear in the 2019 edition of Red Bull Music Festival Los Angeles, where she presented an original work titled La Luz De La Esperanza, a song cycle where San Cha flipped the script on the classic telenovela tale. With her ongoing singles series Processions, San Cha’s essential voice is not only evident, but proves why she is a unique and necessary presence in the music industry.
PICA thanks Libby Werbel and the lumber room for introducing us to San Cha and her work, and Sarah Miller Meigs and lumber room for their support of this program.
DATE Sept. 9 & 10 at 6:00 PM / Sept. 11 at 4:00 PM
LOCATION Winningstad Theatre, P'5, 1111 SW Broadway
TICKET Sliding scale $10, $20, $25
RUN TIME 65 min CAPACITY 275
Gabrielino and Tongva lands (Los Angeles, California)
Writer Sylvan Oswald presents High Winds, a performance text about a trans man whose insomnia sparks a fantastical search for his estranged half-brother through hallucinatory desert landscapes. Gas stations, local legends, and unlikely rock formations become terrain for explorations of fear, fantasy, masculinity, and what lies “deep inside America.”
Video by Katherine Freer and an electro-acoustic score by JJJJJerome Ellis set an otherworldly tone. The performance is based on Sylvan’s book of the same name, created with graphic designer Jessica Fleischmann and published by X Artists’ Books (2017).
Sylvan Oswald is an interdisciplinary artist living in Los Angeles who creates text-based projects exploring trans identity, history, and nonviolent dramaturgy. Current work includes High Winds (Fusebox Festival, X Artists’ Books); text for choreographer Meg Foley’s Blood Baby; and an essay titled “Towards a Trans Theater.” Projects include “Cut Piece,” a personal history of play publishing; Play A Journal of Plays (2003–2011); and Outtakes, a web series. Plays include Trainers: A Theatrical Essay (Gate Theatre, London, Oberon Books); A Kind of Weather (Diversionary Theater, San Diego), Vendetta Chrome (Clubbed Thumb); and Pony (About Face Theater, Chicago). A recipient of a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship, a Soho Rep Dorothy Strelsin Fellowship, a Jerome Fellowship, and residencies at MacDowell, Yaddo, and Ucross, Sylvan is an alum of New Dramatists.
Access notes: Slow-moving video plays throughout the performance, with immersive sound design.
Previous performances at Abrons Arts Center, LAX Festival, and Fusebox Festival.
DATE Sept. 9 & 10 at 6:00 PM / Sept. 11 at 2:00 PM & 6:00 PM
LOCATION PICA Annex, 15 NE Hancock Street
TICKET Sliding scale $10, $20, $25
RUN TIME 50 min CAPACITY 150
Cowlitz, Clackamas, and Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde (Portland, Oregon)
World Premiere. Instigated by Takahiro Yamamoto. Collaborative research by David Thomson, Anna Martine Whitehead, Samita Sinha, and Takahiro Yamamoto. Physically engaged by David Thomson, Anna Martine Whitehead, and Takahiro Yamamoto.
NOTHINGBEING is a project that investigates ways to embody the presence of nothingness and “being,” breathing spaces that we could easily dismiss and considering possibilities for the unfiltered self. Developed with the collaborators Samita Sinha, David Thomson, and Anna Martine Whitehead, this project addresses the notion of presence from multiple modalities such as moments of highly physical movement, a communal meditation, and internal activation of sensory memories.
Takahiro Yamamoto is a multidisciplinary artist and choreographer based in Cowlitz, Clackamas, and Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde (Portland, Oregon). His current conceptual investigations revolve around the phenomenological effects of time, embodied approach to the presence of nothingness, and the social/emotional implications of visibility. He has received support from New England Foundation for the Arts, Bogliasco Foundation, Oregon Community Foundation, MacDowell, National Performance Network, Japan Foundation, Regional Arts & Culture Council, Africa Contemporary Arts Consortium, and others. His performance and visual art works have been presented at Portland Art Museum, Portland Institute for Contemporary Art, Diverseworks, Contemporary Arts Center Cincinnati, The Henry Art Gallery, and GoDown Arts Centre Nairobi, among other venues. Yamamoto holds an MFA in Visual Studies from Pacific Northwest College of Art. He is part of the Portland-based support group Physical Education with Allie Hankins, keyon gaskin, and Lu Yim.
Access notes: This performance will include flickering lights and sudden loud noise.
NOTHINGBEING is supported by the Japan Foundation through the Performing Arts Japan program. It is a National Performance Network (NPN) Creative Fund Project co-commissioned by Portland Institute for Contemporary Art in partnership with Chocolate Factory Theater, On The Boards, and NPN. The Creation Fund is supported by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, Ford Foundation, and the National Endowment for
the Arts (a federal agency). Takahiro Yamamoto is a 2021 NDP Finalist Grant Award recipient. Support was made possible by the New England Foundation for the Arts with funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to address continued sustainability needs during COVID-19 and in support of NOTHINGBEING.
DATE Sept. 9 at 8:00 PM
LOCATION PICA, 15 NE Hancock Street
TICKET Sliding scale $10, $20, $25
RUN TIME 60 min (Screening & Live Performance) CAPACITY 300
Brooklyn, New York
The first in a series, this episode premieres a musical film about a mysterious and transformative encounter, showcases an in-studio performance by vocalist and composer Holland Andrews, and features a conversation between Holland and Joseph.
Featuring new works, exclusive performances, and intimate conversations about life and art, this new music and variety program embraces the idea that with moments of uncertainty come a weird invitation to dream. The program’s name is inspired by Cave of Harmony, Elsa Lanchester’s 1920s London nightclub.
Joseph Keckler is a musician, writer, and artist who often zeroes in on moments of daily life and spins them into absurd and affecting underworld voyages. His musical performances have been presented by the NPR Tiny Desk concert series, Lincoln Center, Centre Pompidou, and others. His debut collection of wriring, Dragon at the Edge of a Flat World, was published in 2018 by Turtle Point Press. This year he is an artist in residence with Dartmouth and the Ringling Museum of Art. Holland Andrews is a vocalist, composer, and performance artist whose work focuses on the abstraction of operatic and extended-technique voice to build soundscapes encompassing both catharsis and dissonance. Previously performing under the stage name Like a Villain, their solo work tours nationally and internationally, and they are among the first artists to release on Leiter, a Berlin-based record label spearheaded by composer Nils Frahm.
Access notes: Parts of this performance include translation of non-English language into visual text only. To request an audio description at least two weeks in advance of the performance, or to inquire about any other access needs, please email the Box Office at boxoffice@pica.org or call 503-224-PICA (7422).
In addition to Keckler’s live performance (Sept. 9), PICA has commissioned the first episode of Cove of Harmony, a new series of collaborative videos by the artist. As part of the TBA Festival, this first episode will premiere digitally via PICA’s YouTube platform and will be available for exclusive access from September 10–18. Please see Joseph Keckler’s event page at pica.org/tba to access a link to this new video work.
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Joseph Keckler Joseph Keckler Joseph Keckler Joseph Keckler Joseph Keckler
Andrews Holland Andrews Holland Andrews Holland Andrews Holland Andrews Holland
SAT 10
DATE Artist Talk, Sept. 10 at 12:00 PM / Exhibition Opening, Sept. 10 at 1:00 PM / Exhibition Dates, Sept. 10–Nov. 20, please check the Cooley Gallery website for open hours, reed.edu/gallery
LOCATION Reed College, 3203 SE Woodstock Boulevard (all) Artist Talk, Reed Chapel, Eliot Hall / Exhibition Opening, Douglas F. Cooley Memorial Art Gallery TICKET Free (all)
RUN TIME Artist Talk, 60 min / Exhibition Opening, 120 min
CAPACITY Artist Talk, 150 / Exhibition Opening, 40
Miccosukee and Seminole lands (South Florida) Lenape lands (New York, New York)
Partner Program: Dreams of Unknown Islands. Reorganized by Stephanie Snyder and Kristan Kennedy for the Cooley Gallery 2022. Originally commissioned and presented by Oolite Arts, curated by Kristan Kennedy 2021.
Sasha Wortzel’s Dreams of Unknown Islands transforms the architecture of the museum into an ecological dreamscape in which coastal shores, animal migrations, and the shifting colors of the sky are transmitted through ritual sound, projected film, and a set of functional sculptures housing five listening islands that urge us to pause, rest, and contemplate. The soundscape is the exhibition’s weather—a Meltempi of voices reciting Kaddish. The sacred Jewish prayer originated ca. 30 BCE, written mostly in Aramaic. Its purpose is to comfort the soul of the deceased and reaffirm the faith of the mourner. Wortzel awakens us to the tenderness necessary to confront the political and ecological challenges we face today. Through visual poetry and recited prayer, Wortzel offers us the experience of mourning—a ritual practiced by both humans and animals—that has evolved over millennia into a pronouncement of belief, hope, and possibility that does not ignore the suffering we face.
Sasha Wortzel is a visual artist and filmmaker working between South Florida (Miccosukee and Seminole lands) and New York City (Lenape lands). Blending the archival and the imaginary, Wortzel uses film, video, installation, sculpture, sound, and performance to explore how the past haunts and inextricably shapes contemporary American life. Their projects examine queer place-making, geographies of resistance, and the systems that marginalize, extract, and erase communities, peoples, and histories. Wortzel’s films have screened at the Museum of Modern Art’s DocFortnight, True/False Film Festival, DOC NYC, BAMcinemaFest, Blackstar, New Orleans Film Festival, Wexner Center for the Arts, Smithsonian American Art Museum, and Berlinale, among others. Their
Still from For those of us who live at the shoreline (ghost forest) , 2022, Sasha Wortzel
work has been exhibited at Oolite Arts, Florida; the New Museum, Brooklyn Museum, and The Kitchen, New York; and SALTS, Birsfelden. Their work is in the permanent collections of the Brooklyn Museum, Studio Museum of Harlem, Leslie Lohman Museum of Art, and Miami Dade County Art in Public Places.
Access notes: For Artist Talk hall is accessible, elevator is available, ASL interpretation is provided. For Exhibition Opening written sound description is provided, gallery is accessible, ground level is ramped.
This exhibition is presented and supported by the Douglas F. Cooley Memorial Art Gallery, Reed College and PICA in collaboration, with additional support from Oolite Arts. The first incarnation of Dreams of Unknown Islands was originally commissioned and presented by Oolite Arts in January of 2021 and curated by Kristan Kennedy, PICA.
SAT 10
DATE Sept. 10 at 6:00 PM / Sept. 8–18
LOCATION PNCA, 511 NW Broadway / In addition to Sept. 10, Bioscope will be on view throughout the Festival at various locations and times. Please visit pica.org/tba, sign up for our newsletters, or follow our Instagram @picapdx for the location announcements
TICKET Free
Portland, Oregon
Shame is a toy house you get from your mother. Going inside it teaches you the limits of your body—it shrinks you and folds you in on yourself. Your cheeks flush, you start feeling small, stomach and anus tighten as you attune to the curvature of yourself.* Upon stepping outside of the house and into the colony square, you find everyone’s gossip on offer, your body expanding beyond its physical bounds and into others’ eyes. They peek into your shame and you peek into theirs.
Bioscope is a traveling video sculpture that incorporates recorded personal interviews, familial theatrics, snippets of Bollywood movies, and performances about the meat and contours of shame.
Video includes interviews with: Vikramaditya Sahai, Srabasti Halder, Dr. Pratibha Kumar, Shukla Kumar, Meenakshi Thirukode, Manju Thakur, Durba Gogia.
garima thakur is a friend, interdisciplinary artist, designer, and educator who is all over the place. She was raised during the ’80s and ’90s in New Delhi, India, a country forever recovering from a colonial hangover—teetering between an aspirational Western identity and a nationalistic one. To help soothe the hangover, she moved to the United States in 2008. Over the last 14 years she has merged installation, video, code, and text to make the bureaucratic structures of immigration visible and critique the alienation they impart. She looks up to Black feminism as a way to crack open the problems of Indian respectability politics and more deeply understand gender, sexuality, and queerness in her practice. She loves to share meals together and wishes you would hit her up for some snax. Her work has received support from organizations like the Ford Family Foundation, the Oregon Arts Commission, Khoj, and the Regional Arts & Culture Council.
*Vikramaditya Sahai
Access notes: People who have trouble with bending or issues with knees will have a hard time accessing the piece. Wheelchair accessible.
DATE Performance and Installation, Sept. 10 at 6:00 PM
Exhibition Dates, Sept. 6–Oct.14 / Gallery hours; Monday–Saturday, 10:00 AM–4:00 PM
LOCATION PNCA, 511 NW Broadway TICKET Free RUN TIME 60 min CAPACITY 125
Detroit, Michigan
the hold
jaamil olawale kosoko’s meditative multi-channel film and installation Syllabus for Black Love serves as the ship inside which the multimedia performance the hold is positioned. Through rhythmic and restorative gestures, the hold creates a perceptive and somatic experience for both performer and audience.
Merging fabric, lighting, time, and sound art as sculptural material within Syllabus for Black Love, the hold is an embrace, a place, a time between time. This performance—featuring an alternating ensemble of performers/doulas—is a slippery, emerging, chameleonic practice rupturing the borders of reality, theatricality, and the digital realm. Jumping through and bending the time-space continuum, the hold behaves as both arrival and exit—a birth passage into the nuance of Black lives attempting the critical and alchemical work of self-examination, discovery, and becoming.
jaamil olawale kosoko is a multi-spirited Nigerian American author, performance artist, and curator of Yoruba and Natchez descent originally from Detroit, MI. Their book Black Body Amnesia: Poems and Other Speech Acts was released in spring 2022. Kosoko is also a 2022 MacDowell Fellow, 2020 Pew Fellow in the Arts, 2019 NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellow in Choreography, 2017-19 Princeton Arts Fellow, 2019 Red Bull Writing Fellow, 2018 NEFA NDP Production Grant recipient, 2017 MAP Fund recipient, and 2017 Cave Canem Poetry Fellow. Their creative practice draws from Black study and queer theories of the body, weaving together visual performance, lecture, ritual, and spiritual practice. Their live art work Chameleon (The Living Installments) premiered virtually in April 2020, and Séancers (2017) and the Bessie nominated #negrophobia (2015) have toured internationally, including Tanz im August (Berlin), Moving in November (Finland), Within Practice (Sweden), Take Me Somewhere (UK), Brighton Festival (UK), Oslo Teaterfestival (Norway), and zürich moves! (Switzerland), among others. Additionally, Kosoko lectures regularly at Princeton University, Stockholm University of the Arts, and Master Exerce ICI-CCN in Montpellier, France. In Fall 2020, they were appointed the third annual Alma Hawkins Visiting Chair in the Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance at UCLA.
SAT 10
DATE Sept. 10 at 8:00 PM
LOCATION PICA, 15 NE Hancock Street
TICKET Sliding scale $10, $20, $25
RUN TIME 60 min CAPACITY 300
Lenape lands (Brooklyn, New York)
THIS Created, written, and performed by Adrienne Truscott. Direction by Ellie Heyman. Set, video, and sound design by Carmine Covelli. Lighting design by Mary Ellen Stebbins.
THIS plays with presence, memory, authorship, narrative authority, linearity, truth, fiction, autobiography, memoir, creative sources, and what demarcates performance, intention, execution. THIS mines some of Truscott’s own large group and solo pieces for material available for theft and repurposing. It investigates liminality, the experience and evaporation of time—as it is parsed with memory, embellishment and trauma—and, contemporaneously, allows the performance itself to be influenced by taking on these things in the midst of our current national trauma. THIS also exists in the awkward space of trying to make a piece of art about trauma while being slightly traumatized by the feeling of inadequacy of making art in the current political landscape. This program will be followed by a DJ set by Shannon Funchess/LIGHT ASYLUM.
Adrienne Truscott’s work crosses lines and methodologies from dance, theater, comedy, and performance art, as drag acts, evening-length pieces, dances, and solos. She’s a 2014 Doris Duke and Foundation for Contemporary Arts grantee. THIS and Wild Bore continue to tour internationally, as well as new pieces MASTERCLASS (with Brokentalkers) and Grey Arias (with Le Gateau Chocolat). She’s one half of The Wau Wau Sisters, a boundary-busting cabaret and circus collaboration, and her critically acclaimed Adrienne Truscott’s Asking For It: A One-Lady Rape About Comedy Starring Her Pussy and Little Else! is considered a game-changer at the performed intersection of rape culture, gender, and comedy. Her work’s been presented at Sydney Opera House, Sophiensaele, Fusebox Festival, The Moth, MIT, Weirdo Night, CBGB, PS122, The Kitchen, MCA Chicago, and the Whitney, among many others. She is the Coordinator of the MA program in Human Rights and the Arts (Bard College).
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DATE Sept. 11 at 2:00 PM
LOCATION Hollywood Theatre, 4122 NE Sandy Boulevard
TICKET Off Pass: $7, tickets available through hollywoodtheatre.org
RUN TIME 60 min, followed by a Q&A with the artist CAPACITY 384
Miccosukee and Seminole lands (South Florida) Lenape lands (New York, New York)
This is an Address: The Films of Sasha Wortzel West Coast Premiere. Partner Program: This is an Address: The Films of Sasha Wortzel is organized by Stephanie Snyder and Kristan Kennedy in collaboration with the Hollywood Theatre.
Celebrated New York and Florida filmmaker Sasha Wortzel debuts her films on the West Coast in this one-night screening. Blending the archival and the imaginary, Wortzel uses film, video, installation, sculpture, sound, and performance to explore how the past haunts and inextricably shapes contemporary American life. Their projects examine queer place-making, geographies of resistance, and the systems that marginalize, extract, and erase communities, peoples, and histories. For This is an Address, we have gathered five shorts spanning the last decade of Wortzel’s practice including an excerpt from Wortzel’s forthcoming feature length film RIVER OF GRASS, which brings audiences on a journey through the past, present, and precarious future of the Everglades, an imperiled and iconic American region on the verge of collapse. For a complete list of films and their descriptions, please visit pica.org/tba.
Sasha Wortzel is a visual artist and filmmaker working between South Florida (Miccosukee and Seminole lands) and New York City (Lenape lands).
Wortzel’s films have screened at the Museum of Modern Art’s DocFortnight, True/False Film Festival, DOC NYC, BAMcinemaFest, Blackstar, New Orleans Film Festival, Wexner Center for the Arts, Smithsonian American Art Museum, and Berlinale, among others. Their work has been exhibited at the New Museum, Brooklyn Museum, and The Kitchen, New York; and SALTS, Birsfelden. Wortzel has been supported by the Sundance Institute, Ford Foundation, Field of Vision, Doc Society, Art Matters, and a NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellowship. Wortzel has participated in residencies including Smack Mellon’s Artist Studio Program, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council Workspace Program, Abrons Arts Center, Watermill Center, New York; AIRIE (Artists in Residence in the Everglades) and Oolite Arts, Miami Beach. Wortzel’s film This is an Address (2020) is distributed by Field of Vision. Happy Birthday Marsha! (2018; co-director Tourmaline) won special mention at Outfest and is distributed by Frameline. Their work is in the permanent collections of the Brooklyn Museum, Studio Museum of Harlem, Leslie Lohman
Museum of Art, and Miami Dade County Art in Public Places. She has been featured in publications including the New York Times, Artforum, Art in America, and New York Magazine. Wortzel received an MFA in Integrated Media Arts from Hunter College.
Access notes: There is a wheelchair space available in the theater. Assistive listening devices are available upon request. This screening is presented and supported by the Douglas F. Cooley Memorial Art Gallery, Reed College and PICA in collaboration, with additional support from Oolite Arts and the Hollywood Theatre.
SUN 11
DATE Sept. 11 at 8:00 PM
LOCATION PICA, 15 NE Hancock Street
TICKET Sliding scale $5, $10, $20
RUN TIME 120 min CAPACITY 300
Portland, Oregon / Oakland, California
Arab.AMP Live Portland Premiere
Arab.AMP Live presents the legendary Sir Richard Bishop, guitarist and founding member of the band Sun City Girls. Internationally celebrated, Sir Richard Bishop “combines soulfulness and advanced technique with a panache that’s nearly unrivaled among today’s guitarists” (Dave Segal, OC Weekly). Arab.AMP Live also features Lime Rickey International, whose hybrid performances are built with voice, transactive surfaces, and movement. Portland’s own Descending Pharaohs join the night with music influenced by Arabic/Anatolian electric music, spiritual jazz, and British psych.
Richard Bishop, guitarist and founding member of Sun City Girls (1981–2007), released his first solo record in 1998 on the Revenant label under the moniker Sir Richard Bishop. He has since released on a variety of labels: Locust Music, Southern Records, Editions Mego, Unrock, and Drag City.
Lime Rickey International was nominated for a 2019 Bessie Award in Music. Recent exhibitions include Wysing Art Centre/British Council, JAM3A Festival, FUSEBOX Festival, and the Tarek Atoui Sound Residency at Sharjah Art Foundation.
Descending Pharaohs is an ethno-psych trio soundtracking the alleyway fight scenes to near-eastern films of the ’70s. Descending Pharaohs is Ricardo Esway on guitar, Larold Will on drums and electronics, and Theo Khoury on bass, oud, and djoura.
Curated by Leyya Mona Tawil, Arab.AMP is a platform for experimental music and live art by artists of the SWANA diaspora and their allied communities. Arab.AMP Live is a nomadic live event series operating in partnership with venues and festivals inter/nationally.
Arab.AMP, a program of ELIXIR 501c3, is supported in part by the California Arts Council, the City of Oakland, Foundation for Contemporary Arts Emergency Grant, Kenneth Rainin Foundation, and the Center for Cultural Innovation.
DATE Sept. 15 & 16 at 6:00 PM / Sept. 17 & 18 at 2:00 PM
LOCATION PICA Annex, 15 NE Hancock Street TICKET Sliding scale $10, $20, $25
RUN TIME Approx. 80 min CAPACITY 150
Portland, Oregon
Clown Down 2: Clown Out of Water World Premiere. Co-produced by RISK/REWARD.
Clown Down 2: Clown Out of Water finds Portland’s premiere drag clown, Carla Rossi, trapped on a rock in the middle of the ocean while the sea level rises from melting ice caps. Alone with a seagull afflicted with IBS, Carla encounters the world’s last surviving polar bear, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a death metal moon, and Liberace and Liza Minnelli (David Saffert and Jillian Snow Harris) in this multimedia drag farce that utilizes puppetry by Matthew Leavitt, interactive video, Rez Metal by Damage OverDose, and kinetic sculpture by David Eckard—all as Carla navigates climate disaster and the terror and joy of living on an increasingly distressed planet.
Anthony Hudson (Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde) is a multidisciplinary artist and writer sometimes better known as Portland’s premiere drag clown, Carla Rossi. Together they host and program Queer Horror—the only ongoing LGBTQ+ horror film and performance series in the country—at the historic Hollywood Theatre. Anthony has received project support and fellowships from the NEA, National Performance Network, Native Arts and Cultures Foundation, First Peoples Fund, Western Arts Alliance, Oregon Arts Commission, Oregon Community Foundation, USArtists International, Ucross Foundation, Caldera Arts Center, Portland Community College, and more; Anthony’s performances have been featured at the New York Theatre Workshop, La Mama, PICA’s TBA Festival, Portland and Seattle Art Museums, and Portland Center Stage, and have toured internationally. Anthony is currently adapting their award-winning solo show Looking for Tiger Lily into a book. Find out more at TheCarlaRossi.com.
Clown Down 2: Clown Out of Water is a National Performance Network (NPN) Creation & Development Fund project co-commissioned by PICA in partnership with the Western Arts Alliance’s Advancing Indigenous Performance Program (AIP), Bunnell Street Arts Center, and the Bodecker Foundation.
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DATE Sept. 15 at 9:00 PM
LOCATION PICA, 15 NE Hancock Street
TICKET Sliding scale $5, $10, $20
CAPACITY 300
Global
Knowledge of Wounds, co-curated by S.J Norman and Joseph M. Pierce.
They Can Never Burn The Stars expands through the sonic spectrum, engaging sub-bass tones to high-pitched sirens whose interactions entangle the spatial experience of listening with the expanded field of embodied proprioception. Waves, in their many forms, arrive and depart as constant companions throughout the experience, with their presence evoking the non-static quality of our condition as spatial-acoustic beings. This work takes at its heart that survivance is sanctified and ensured through the ever-changing relationship of knowledge and tradition to that which is more than human.
In this creative engagement between Cree sound artist Chloe Alexandra Thompson and Pacific Islander interdisciplinary artist DB Amorin, the pair work towards a joint generative investigation of these themes.
Knowledge of Wounds is the collaborative curatorial practice of S.J Norman (Wiradjuri) and Joseph M. Pierce (Cherokee Nation). Since its first iteration in Lenapehoking/NYC in 2020, and currently operational as a hybrid live/digital program, K.o.W is continually evolving in its mission to foreground the work of Indigenous creators and knowledge workers across hemispheres and disciplines. www.knowledgeofwounds.com, Instagram @knowledgeofwounds
Chloe Alexandra Thompson is a Cree sound artist approaching sound as a mode of connection. Her work engages tactics of material minimalism to create site-specific installations that sculpt droning, maximalist experiences out of space and sound.
DB Amorin (b. Honolulu, Hawai’i) is an artist addressing audio-visual non-linearity as a container for intersectional experience, often focusing on the role error plays as a generative opportunity. His media-centered installations are the result of DIY methodologies, lo-fi translations, and persistent, inquisitive experimentation of available materials.
KoW Partners: Performance Space New York, Performance Space (Sydney, Australia), PICA, Ballroom Marfa, The Momentary, and Blakdance.
DATE Sept. 16 at 8:00 PM
LOCATION PICA, 15 NE Hancock Street
TICKET Sliding scale $5, $10, $20
CAPACITY 300
ALL IN: a performance gathering hosted by First Nations Performing Arts
First Nations Performing Arts is focused on cultural change, commissioning, touring, and presenting Indigenous performance, as well as capacity building for the Indigenous and non-indigenous performing arts sectors. For our all-ages intergenerational gathering we celebrate the FNPA Network Track members—a coalition of First Nations performing artists—in an evening which will evolve through sharing food, storytelling, interactive performance, music, noise, and artistic experimentation.
The work of First Nations Performing Arts (FNPA) is distinct in our national landscape. FNPA seeks to be the Indigenous-led initiative that makes visible, public, and transparent the urgent decolonizing work the performing arts field in what is currently called the US must do.
DATE Sept. 17 & 18 at 4:00 PM
LOCATION BodyVox, 1201 NW 17th Avenue
TICKET Sliding scale $10, $20, $25
RUN TIME 55 min CAPACITY 175
Stockholm, Sweden / Tiohtià:ke lands (Montréal, Canada)
Muscogee lands (Tulsa, Oklahoma)
Radio III / ᎦᏬᏂᏍᎩ KT
Radio III / ᎦᏬᏂᏍᎩ KT is the first collaboration between Hanako Hoshimi-Caines, Zoë Poluch, and Elisa Harkins. It is an Indigenous futuristic concert, a beautiful and uncomfortable dance performance, and a perverse triangle of shifting power that seeks to be unfaithful to both minimalism and postmodern dance’s claims to so-called “neutrality.”
This choreography in the expanded field haunts the recognizable toolbox of abstraction, form, repetition, and pattern by striving to make visible that which has been kept invisible and illegible in colonial systems of aesthetics.
Within Radio III / ᎦᏬᏂᏍᎩ KT there are many references to the number 3; there are 3 performers, the piece has 3 sections, and there are 3 duets, one being a triplet. Created and developed on the Muscogee Reservation, Stockholm, Sweden, and Montréal, Quebec, the piece brings together components and concerns that are an interdisciplinary and counter-colonial approach to performance.
Hanako Hoshimi-Caines is a mother, dancer, performance-maker, writer, questioner, enthusiast, and organizer born and based in Tiohtià:ke (Montréal). Her work plays with the pleasure and the haunt of the familiar as strategies of resistance and transformation. She uses her immediate familial relations as a treasure trove of mystical and practical insights into art and performance making. Hanako has collaborated with a range of dance artists, choreographers, and companies, notably the Cullberg Ballet in Stockholm. Her independent and collaborative works have been shown in Canada and internationally. Hanako is currently the guest co-curator at the Centre de Création O Vertigo in Montreal.
Zoë Poluch’s artistic practice puts into motion different mediums and takes shape in different rooms. Her relationship with the “contemporary dance” scene is based on a long-term and practice-based interest in the politics and poetics of moving and sensing. She looks forward to the far future, perhaps 2070, when she will inaugurate a dance company for dancing people over 70 years old and tour on a solar airplane. In the past, she studied and worked in Canada and Belgium. Since 2010 she has been based in Stockholm, Sweden, and works at Stockholm University of the Arts. She is currently on parental leave.
Elisa Harkins is a Native American (Cherokee/Muscogee) artist and composer based in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Her work is concerned with translation, language preservation, and Indigenous musicology. Harkins uses the Cherokee and Mvskoke languages, electronic music, sculpture, and the body as her tools. Harkins received a BA from Columbia College, Chicago, and an MFA from CalArts. She has since continued her education at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. She has exhibited her work at Crystal Bridges, documenta 14, The Hammer Museum, The Heard Museum, and MoMA. Radio III/ᎦᏬᏂᏍᎩ KT is a dance performance with Hanako Hoshimi-Caines and Zoë Poluch that features music by Harkins. With support from PICA and Western Front, songs from the performance have been collected into a limited-edition double LP which can be found on Harkins’ Bandcamp. Harkins resides on the Muscogee (Creek) Reservation and is an enrolled member of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation.
Funded by Canada Council for the Arts, Swedish Arts Council, Swedish Arts Grants Committee, and Tulsa Artist Fellowship. Residencies and co-production: MAI, MDT, Dance Victoria, Agora de la danse, The Stable. International representation & production: Nordberg Movement.
SAT 17
DATE Sept. 17 at 9:00 PM
LOCATION PICA, 15 NE Hancock Street
TICKET Sliding scale $5, $10, $20
RUN TIME 5 hrs CAPACITY 300
Portland, Oregon
ADAB (T4T LUV NRG), Ryan Bunao, Bianca AE Mack, Haevyn, Cay Horiuchi, Adam Lucero, Jack Malstrom, Jen Tam, Samantha Pollock, Ava Douglas, Baby Timm, Coco Madrid, Laura Anne Whitley, Nikki Nicole, Nzinga Valentine, and more.
UwU & Friends is a multidisciplinary event series showcasing underground dance music created by, and for, Portland’s Queer, Trans, Black, Indigenous, People of Color, and Trans/Gender nonconforming community.
Through collaboration, music, site-specific video projection, installation, and art, we showcase established and emerging DJs and artists to explore a new type of party—a queer utopia. With the dancefloor as the center, we aim to rejuvenate our community by creating safe, healing spaces featuring art, music, and dance.
UwU Collective is a Portland-based artist collective organizing underground events with an aim to uplift our Queer, Trans, Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (QTBIPOC) and Trans/Gender non-conforming (T/GNC) community. We are a collective of nine members and over 30 collaborators. We are multidisciplinary artists whose practices include DJing, performance, sound, digital, video, and installation art. Together, we share values and visions imagining and exercising an empathetic world in which we can thrive and celebrate one another through underground music and multidisciplinary art practices.
UwU honors and contributes to the legacy of our queer BIPOC ancestors who have paved the way for one another and those to come next against all odds. We are here today to imagine our version of the future—creating intentional space for joy, healing, and hope through music, collaboration, experimentation, empathy for one another, and the drive to create a better world.
Access notes: This event will feature immersive AV experiences with multiple video projections.
DATE Sept. 18 at 1:00 PM, doors at 12:30 PM
LOCATION Farm in Portland Metro. Ticket holders will be notified of the location in advance of the event
TICKET Off Pass: This event is free or by donation for Black folks. $80 for all others. Purchase your ticket at bit.ly/3P4pM3f. Black folks are welcome to enter the code “blackmovement” for free tickets. If you’d like to make a donation, you can do so on Venmo @blackfeast, Cashapp $blackfeast, or PayPal blackfeastdinner@gmail.com.
RUN TIME 180 min CAPACITY 40
Multnomah, Wasco, Cowlitz, Kathlamet, Clackamas, Bands of Chinook, Tualatin, Kalapuya, and Molalla lands (Portland, Oregon) Chochenyo and Ramaytush Ohlone lands (Bay Area, California)
Black Feast: Black Imagerial Partner Program: Organized by Black Feast.
Black Feast is a culinary event celebrating Black artists and writers through food. At our table, guests participate in an experience that weaves together food and art, where Salimatu works with Black artists to create a multi-course, vegan, gluten-free meal based off of the artist’s work.
In Black Imagerial, movement artists Intisar Abioto and Akela Jaffi present a collectively held offering honoring the legacies of Black movers, dancers, and choreographers in Portland. With eight Black dancers and movement artists moving with the land, Black Imagerial recognizes Black movement as embodied image-making and visionary practice. This meal is created as a celebration, a dance, and an offering. This meal is created for you. Salimatu Amabebe (they/he), is a Bay Area-based chef, multimedia artist and the founder/director of Black Feast. Amabebe’s work focuses on the intersection of food and art, drawing from family memories, Nigerian recipes, and Black culinary history. @salimatuamabebe
Intisar Abioto (she/they) is an artist working within photography, dance, and writing. Her works refer to the breath/breadth of people of African descent against the expanse of their storied, geographic, and imaginative landscapes.
Akela Jaffi (she/her) is a writer and dancer living in Portland, Oregon. A graduate of Jefferson High school, she is the founder of Black Artists Summer Showcase.
Annika Hansteen-Izora (she/they) is a queer Black poet, designer, and writer based in Brooklyn, New York. Annika uses poetry, design, and performance to explore themes of healing, Black liberation, afrofuturism, and queerness. They are the head of design at Somewhere Good and a creative contributor at Black Feast. @annika.izora
PICA’s Creative Exchange Lab has been designed to promote artistic exchange, instigate peer-to-peer dialogue, and foster the development of new works with a focus on serving artists working at the intersection of different forms. The residency program is comprised of two labs annually taking place each spring and fall. For TBA 2022 we have invited a diverse intergenerational cohort of artists, emerging and established, from a spectrum of disciplines and cultural perspectives. Our fall 2022 Creative Exchange Lab artists are Princess Bouton (Portland, OR), Emily Jones (Portland, OR), Satpreet Kahlon (Seattle, WA), Hannah Krafcik (Portland, OR), Harun Morrison (River Lea and Regent’s Canal, UK), and Pallavi Sen (Berkshires, MA).
Reflecting a field-wide need for in-depth cross-disciplinary research opportunities for artists, the labs offer essential generative time for research and experimentation, cross-disciplinary collaboration, and self-directed interaction between the participating local, national, and international artists.
Princess Bouton is a Black Transfeminine freelance filmmaker and performance artist based in Portland, Oregon. She graduated from the Portland State University film program in the spring of 2020. Her work often incorporates movement art and explores topics of intersectionality and pleasure activism. She has a dance background that includes modern dance, ballet, and vogue and she creates from a place that draws from each form. Princess Bouton is also a community builder and organizer in the Portland Kiki ballroom scene and is the princess of the kiki House Of Flora. The QTPOC models seen in her work are often individuals from her local queer community, who she invites to be highlighted and celebrated.
Emily Jones (she/they) is a dancer and choreographer based in Portland, OR. Emily’s choreography materializes from sensitivity and intuition, and they are curious about the tensions that exist between social power dynamics and unnamed personal needs. In recent years Emily has been collaborating with Hannah Krafcik. Their performances together are shaped by consent, emphasizing relationality over virtuosity. Emily and Hannah’s performances have included self-made components such as sound scores and video and audio descriptions—they seek to broaden accessibility through the use of multiple mediums. Emily and Hannah’s work has been presented at New Expressive Works (Portland, OR), Art Klub NOLA (New Orleans, LA), Pieter Performance Space (Los Angeles, CA), Performance Works NW, and Portland Institute for Contemporary Art (Portland, OR). Emily has also performed in others’ works in Portland and the Bay Area. Additionally Emily facilitates movement practices and is a bodyworker.
Satpreet Kahlon is a Panjabi-born artist, organizer, and educator based in Seattle, WA. She earned her MFA in sculpture from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2019 on a full fellowship. In addition to her studio practice, which has been featured in Hyperallergic and Artforum, she is co-founder and vice president of yәhaẁ Indigenous Creatives, an organization that has supported over 400 artists in the Pacific Northwest with over $2 million in opportunities since its 2017 founding. For this work, she was named one of the most influential people in Seattle by Seattle Magazine in 2019. She is a 2022 Roddenberry Fellow for “new and innovative strategies to safeguard human rights and ensure an equal and just society for all.” She has been supported by Brown University, the Foundation for Contemporary Arts, Vermont Studio Center, the Magnum Foundation, and others. Satpreet is a 2022 Neddy finalist in painting, and she won the 2022 Bellevue Art Museum Biennial Curatorial Excellence Award, where she will have a solo show in 2023.
Hannah Krafcik (they/them) is a Portland-based interdisciplinary neuroqueer artist and writer whose work emerges from ongoing reflections on social patterning and censorship, (over)stimulation, perseveration, and intuition. Their practices span dance, writing, new media, and sound design. Hannah continues to be influenced by their collaboration with artistic partner Emily Jones.
Harun Morrison is an artist and writer based on the River Lea and Regent’s Canal. He is currently a UK associate at Delfina Foundation & Horniman Museum and Designer and Researcher in Residence at V&A Dundee. His forthcoming novel The Escape Artist will be published by Book Works in 2023. Since 2006, Harun has collaborated with Helen Walker as part of the collective practice They Are Here. He is a former trustee of the Black Cultural Archive (est. 1981).
Pallavi Sen is from Bombay, India. She works with installation, printmaking, textiles, and intuitive, musical movement. Current interests include planting gardens and meadows, inner lives of birds and animals, the grief of the anthropocene, South Asian costumes, domestic architecture, altars, atheism and magical thinking, pattern histories, friendship + love, past/present/future lover, work spaces, work tables, eco-feminism, love poems, the gates to Indian homes, walking, seeds, and twice daily cooking. She received her MFA in Sculpture + Extended Media from the Virginia Commonwealth University. She is the Assistant Professor of Multiples + Distributed Art at Williams College and dean at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. She is the author of Dead Planet Cookbook, and is currently working on her second book about a garden based curriculum.
In the spirit of alternative education and late-night learning, we bring you NIGHT SCHOOL, a series of weekday evening performance-lectures that celebrate experimental and creative research, blur the boundaries between art and academia, and disrupt established forms of knowledge sharing and production.
This newest addition to TBA invites four artist-scholars to help us reimagine spaces for curiosity, criticality, and conversation. NIGHT SCHOOL is co-sponsored by the MA in Critical Studies Program at Pacific Northwest College of Art at Willamette University.
TUE 13
DATE Sept. 13 at 6:00 PM
LOCATION PICA, 15 NE Hancock Street TICKET Sliding scale $5, $10, $20
RUN TIME 60 min CAPACITY 300
Portland, Oregon
“Drag Animism” explores Pepper’s personal and artistic explorations into cyborg consciousness and dirt-witch-glamour. It’s a visual and performative meditation on digital and physical bodies, the enchantment of nature, and the slippery potential of activating “persona power.”
So spice, they named her twice—Pepper Pepper is a multimedia performance artist and writer. Their work explores the comedy and vulnerability of life through a surreal filter of magic, history, and technology. Their 15+ year participation in Portland’s drag nightlife parallels collaborations with Portland theater and dance companies Hand2Mouth Theater, Risk/Reward, and Linda Austin Dance. A 2020 Visual Arts Fellow from Oregon Arts Commission, Pepper actively hybridizes visual and performance practices through projects like Diva Practice and, more recently, Pink Moment—a series of self-portraits about gender, magic, and digital identity in ink, video, and dance.
Access notes: This performance includes strobe effects.
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DATE Sept. 14 at 6:00 PM
LOCATION PICA, 15 NE Hancock Street TICKET Sliding scale $5, $10, $20
RUN TIME 60 min CAPACITY 300
Zach Blas Toronto, Canada
NIGHT SCHOOL: New Work by Zach Blas
Renowned artist, filmmaker, and writer Zach Blas will present a brand new performance lecture as part of the NIGHT SCHOOL program for this year’s TBA Festival. Blas’ engagement in Portland is in partnership with the MA in Critical Studies program at Pacific Northwest College of Art at Willamette University.
Zach Blas is an artist, filmmaker, writer, and Assistant Professor of Visual Studies at the University of Toronto. His practice spans moving image, computation, theory, performance, and science fiction. Recent exhibitions include the 12th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art; British Art Show 9; Positions #6, Van Abbemuseum; Uncanny Valley: Being Human in the Age of AI at the de Young Museum; The Body Electric at the Walker Art Center; and the 12th Gwangju Biennale. His 2021 artist monograph Unknown Ideals is published by Sternberg Press.
NIGHT SCHOOL NIGHT SCHOOL NIGHT SCHOOL NIGHT SCHOOL NIGHT SCHOOL
SCHOOL NIGHT SCHOOL
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Zach Blas Zach Blas
Zach Blas Zach Blas Zach Blas Zach Blas Zach Blas
DATE Sept. 14 at 8:00 PM
LOCATION PICA, 15 NE Hancock Street
TICKET Sliding scale $5, $10, $20
RUN TIME 60 min CAPACITY 300
Nana Adusei-Poku New York, New York / Berkeley, California
NIGHT SCHOOL: The Black Melancholic
Deriving from the antique alchemistic concept of the four humors, melancholia has been a subject in science, culture, and art for centuries. Originally seen as the result of an imbalance of one of the four humors connected to a specific temperament called “black bile,” melancholia was connected to a deep sense of sadness that was believed to lead to depression, insanity, and later genius in the arts. Based in an auto-biographical collage this lecture will talk about death, birth, and past-potential-futures, proposing Black Melancholia as a place of solace and care for Black Life. Nana Adusei-Poku, PhD, is Assistant Professor in African Diasporic Art History in the Department of History of Art at UC Berkeley, California. She was previously Associate Professor and Luma Foundation Fellow at the Center for Curatorial Studies, Bard College, New York. Her book Taking Stakes in the Unknown: Tracing Post-Black Art was published in 2021 with Transcript Verlag and her articles have been published in Nka: Journal of Contemporary African Art, e-flux, Kunstforum International, Flash Art, L’Internationale and darkmatter. She curated the event “Performances of Nothingness” (Academy of Arts, Berlin, 2018) and Black Melancholia (Hessel Museum Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, New York 2022).
THU 15
DATE Sept. 15 at 8:00 PM
LOCATION PICA, 15 NE Hancock Street
TICKET Sliding scale $5, $10, $20
RUN TIME 60 min CAPACITY 300
and
Understanding extraterrestrials as a product of American mythology requires seeing the multiplicity of fears in the American consciousness. Just like the hydra of conspiracy that shapes America as a nation, the intersections between extraterrestrials and the American nation-state fracture into even more intricate pieces of an unsolvable puzzle. Multimedia artist and scholar Kite performs an experimental lecture, “What’s on the Earth is in the Stars, and What’s in the Stars is on the Earth,” which probes the real conspiracies through multiple dimensions: Lakota epistemologies and the American paranormal.
Kite aka Suzanne Kite is an Oglala Lakota performance artist, visual artist, and composer raised in Southern California, with an MFA from Bard College’s Milton Avery Graduate School, and is a PhD candidate at Concordia University, Research Assistant for the Initiative for Indigenous Futures, and a 2019 Trudeau Scholar. Her research is concerned with contemporary Lakota ontologies through research-creation, computational media, and performance practice. Recently, Kite has been developing a body interface for movement performances, carbon fiber sculptures, and immersive video and sound installations.
This program is part of Knowledge of Wounds. Learn more at knowledgeofwounds.com
Pahá kiŋ lená wakháŋ , 2017, Kite
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Where is the Box Office?
From Aug. 15–Sept. 18 the Box Office can be reached by email at boxoffice@pica.org, or by calling 503-224-PICA. From Sept. 8–18, Box Office staff will be available in person at each venue one hour before the start of the program.
Is TBA:22 online or in person?
We are back! Most of this year’s Festival is in person at PICA and in the city of Portland, Oregon. There are a few programs that will be available to watch online. You can learn more about where to watch on select programs’ web pages at pica.org/tba.
How do I buy a TBA:22 pass?
You can buy a TBA:22 pass from our website pica.org/tba, by emailing our Box Office at boxoffice@pica.org, or by calling 503-224-PICA.
Do I need a pass to attend TBA:22?
No. You can purchase individual tickets for each event, or you can buy a pass for varying levels of Festival access. Pass levels are:
Patron Pass (All Access + VIP) $500 Buy One, Give One $300 Full Pass $150 One-Weekend Pass $75
What does my pass include?
Patron Pass (All Access + VIP): Priority admission to all performances, a special VIP event, festival concierge service, and full access to exhibitions and NIGHT SCHOOL programs. Plus, a donation to PICA in support of TBA. Reservations are required for all ticketed programs. Please email the Box Office at boxoffice@pica.org to make your reservations.
Buy One, Give One: Admission to all performances, and full access to exhibitions and NIGHT SCHOOL programs. Plus a donation to PICA’s Ticket Bank to support wider access to the Festival. Reservations are required for all ticketed programs. Please email the Box Office at boxoffice@pica.org to make your reservations.
Full Pass: Admission to all performances, and full access to exhibitions and NIGHT SCHOOL programs. Reservations are required for all ticketed programs. Please email the Box Office at boxoffice@pica.org to make your reservations.
One-Weekend Pass: Access to all performances on either Weekend 1 (Sept. 8–11) or Weekend 2 (Sept. 15–18) of TBA, plus NIGHT SCHOOL programs. Reservations are required for all ticketed programs. Please email the Box Office at boxoffice@pica.org to make your reservations.
Do I need reservations if I have a pass?
Yes, reservations are required to guarantee seating. Once your pass has been purchased, please contact the TBA Box Office by email at boxoffice@pica.org to make your reservation.
Is anything “Off Pass”?
Yes. Black Feast: Black Imagerial, San Cha TBA:22 Opening Night, and This is an Address: The Films of Sasha Wortzel are “Off Pass” and must be purchased separately. Please see pica.org/tba for details or contact the Box Office by email at boxoffice@pica.org or by calling 503-224-PICA.
What
As a general rule, there is no late seating. All shows begin promptly as listed. For performances at PICA, you must check in no later than 15 minutes before curtain to ensure seating, even with a pass reservation.
If I reserve a seat for an in-person performance at PICA does my child get in for free?
Yes, your child may attend for free if they can sit on your lap. Otherwise, you will need to reserve an additional seat. Please note, while we welcome children and babies, we may have to ask you to wait in the lobby if there is any disturbance to the live performance. Which shows are appropriate for children?
Can I bring my family?
PICA supports freedom of speech for artists and the audiences’ right to choose what to see and hear. Due to the nature of live performance, we cannot prescreen all works for content. However, if you have specific concerns or questions, our Box Office staff can offer suggestions on shows.
Can you refund or exchange my pass?
All ticket and pass sales are final. There are no refunds or exchanges. In event that we need to cancel/postpone a show due to unforeseen circumstances—such as wildfires, poor air quality, or shifts in the pandemic—we will still pay our artists/crew as promised. PICA is committed to paying our artists and crew for scheduled performances. In the case of a cancellation or postponement, we ask audiences to please consider the cost of your pass as a donation in solidarity with fair wages, rather than requesting a refund. That said, if you would prefer to have your pass purchase refunded, you can contact the Box Office at boxoffice@pica.org or call 503-224-PICA, and a Box Office representative will be happy to assist you.
PICA is committed to accessibility as a value, ethic, and opportunity for learning, growth, and change. As we strive to create greater access to our programs and events, including the TBA Festival, we welcome feedback and dialogue from audiences and artists about their experiences and suggestions for improvement. To inform TBA staff of access needs, make requests for services, or offer feedback on our approach to access, please contact the TBA Box Office at boxoffice@pica.org or 503-224-PICA. For more information on the accessibility of TBA:22 venues and PICA’s approach to access, please visit pica.org/tba22-access.
PICA wants to remain considerate of our staff, artists, and guests who have varying levels of vulnerability, safety, and comfort. We require either proof of vaccination OR a negative COVID-19 test (taken 48 hours before arrival). For all indoor programs, all guests over the age of two are required to wear a mask. It is also recommended that you wear a mask while outdoors at any TBA:22 event, especially if keeping a distance of six feet is not possible. Anyone who is experiencing or exhibiting any symptoms of COVID-19 or who has been in contact with others who are is asked to stay home to avoid the risk of exposing others. These policies are subject to change as the conditions of COVID-19 shift. Please visit pica.org/tba for more information.
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PICA is located in the Boise-Eliot neighborhood of Northeast Portland. We are close to bus lines 4, 6, 17, and 44. Stops for the A Loop and B Loop Streetcar are approximately 0.3 miles from our building. The nearest MAX station is Rose Quarter Transit Center, which is approximately 0.5 miles away. On-street parking is available. Please be aware that we reside in a residential area and therefore ask that all PICA guests, staff, and audience members treat our neighborhood and neighbors, housed and unhoused, with the utmost respect.
Have questions? We are here to help! Email boxoffice@pica.org or call 503-224-PICA.
PICA is the creative economy in action. Become a corporate sponsor and declare your business to be a cultural leader. Your support will help PICA to fund artist residences and commissions, subsidize free programs, engage in a civic dialogue with the community, and continue to bring leading-edge contemporary art to Portland.
Benefits of sponsorship include: connecting with PICA’s community of vibrant art enthusiasts, who embrace innovation and exploration; unique and memorable experiences with contemporary art for your staff and clients; invitations to exclusive sponsor receptions; acknowledgment listings in printed materials, on donor walls, and on the PICA website; and invitations to year-round visiting and resident artist events.
Portland Institute for Contemporary Art receives support from the Oregon Arts Commission, a state agency funded by the State of Oregon, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
This project is supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts. To find out more about how National Endowment for the Arts grants impact individuals and communities, visit www.arts.gov.
