We’ve been experimenting with ways to connect the performing artists and the audience, while minimizing interruptions and disturbances.
Here’s something we borrowed from our previous project, the Storefront Library, which included a question box for library patrons to drop a question for a volunteer librarian named Astrid. She would do her best to answer the inquiry by the next day. (We called it the Ask Astrid box.)
The box is back in service, and now it allows Work In Progress passers-by to ask a question of the dancers or the choreographer. The answers are posted the next day on our web site, like this:
Question from Lauren:
I like the lab coats. How do you decide on costumes for a piece like this. And what will the storyteller (man) wear at the show?
Answer from Jody Weber, Weber Dance:
Great!
I decided on the labcoats because I like how they clearly delineate the idea of science. Lab coats also protect us- ie separate us from what we are studying. The piece investigates an oppositional idea to this- that of being in unity with the world around us- so starting with the lab coats and eventually shedding them releases us from the artificial barrier we have between ourselves and what we perceive in the world.
I think the storyteller, Jon Turk, will wear somthing quite ordinary. Simple pants and a shirt- he is all of us on this journey. The dancers will be more elaborately attired and their costumes will change throughout the evening. The dance costumes will help change and, I hope, enhance the mood of each section. I plan to meet with my costumer, Anna Zamarippa, in the next month to start planning the dancers’ costumes.
Drop by this weekend during the Fort Point Art Walk and ask a question. Updated schedule here.