RadFest Includes Marginalized Communities In The Show
Eggtooth Productions presents the Radical Interconnectedness Festival that offers art celebrating those whose narratives have been marginalized. The festival, which takes place April 26-27, 2019 in Turners Falls, Mass., will feature art of all kinds that engages issues of race, age, gender, religion, class, and those aspects of cultural identity that have been suppressed.
Linda McInerney, who has been offering festival like this for 8 years, had this to say, “As the artistic director of a theater company, I feel a personal responsibility to shed light on the issues our society faces through the art we produce, present, and commission. One of the most important issues of our time is increasing racism and discrimination against marginalized people.
My job is to offer art that invites the participant to dig into his/her/their own implicit bias in order to overcome it. I want to create projects that jar me/us and check me/us on an ongoing basis. That checking and jarring is uncomfortable. But discomfort is critical; if we are feeling “comfortable” then we are not growing, evolving, or changing with the times. The plan is to dig back, find the stories that have been suppressed, and tell them. Because art is not necessarily beholden to dominant institutions (military, economic, political) that invitation allows for an openness of heart in the experience. When the heart is open, implicit bias may be addressed without blame or judgment. There need not be any defensiveness. Just tell the stories.”
Eggtooth will also offer a conversation with the artists and humanist scholars to place the conversation in context on April 28, 2019, from noon until 3:30 p.m. in the Cohn Commons at Greenfield Community College in Greenfield, Mass. Lunch is provided. There will be a wide range of artistic expression including music, dance, theatrical, visual, immersive, installation and other forms in alternative spaces all within walking distance in downtown Turners Falls.
The artists participating in Festival include Broadway makeup designer (Wicked, Beetlejuice among many more) Joe Dulude II who is also a drag artist under the name of Mr. Drag. He said this; “My piece is about exploring my identity through the microscope of my living room in the 1970s. It is an installation that will allow the viewer to immerse themselves into my past and see the elements, hear the music and become part of my history and identity. I wanted to be a part of the Rad Fest because I think storytelling, in all its forms, is important. I hope to be able to affect emotions and memories in the viewers to make them think about their own past and their own identities.”
Karen Werner, internationally known sound designer whose piece is called Strange Radio: Live documentary radio transmission on the layers of time, sound, and memory in Jewish Vienna offered, “I am a fan of art that serves our sense of understanding and deep feeling and both sense of interconnection AND differences.”
“Radfest weaves a diverse tapestry made of personal experience, research, and exploration. It collectively provides the audience and participants the opportunity to examine and celebrate the specific while contributing and being exposed to a larger theme. These facets shine individually and amplify one another collectively. Which, to me, is the gift diversity provides, and it is why I’m proud to be performing in Radfest,” said Lori Holmes Clark, Broadway dancer who will perform a piece about neurological difference called Cloudy with a Chance of Fringe.
“Personally, I love the name ‘Radical Interconnectedness’ and all that it implies. Our organization Voices from Inside is certainly seeking radical connection and interconnection between people who might never otherwise come in contact with one another–specifically women who have been incarcerated or are in recovery from addiction and the broader public,” said Jennifer Abeles who works with incarcerated and formerly incarcerated women, many of whom battle addictions. “Our women find their voices through writing and then raise their voices in the world, which suffers so greatly from the silencing of too many populations. We are all necessary human resources for one another.”
Alex Demelo is the director of an other-abled theater company who will perform said, “I am participating in the Rad Fest because, most importantly, it gives to the members of the Arc Inclusion Theatre an opportunity to be proud of themselves. We don’t want to be seen as disabled people, but able people who do art. The art we do is the art of understanding feelings, the art of helping one another to overcome difficulties, the art of loving one another in the same way we love ourselves, the art of learning about integration, the art of supporting one another, and the art of having fun.”
Katherine Adler, movement artist said, “I am presenting ‘Artifacts of the Ephemeral’, a 30-hour solo durational performance. I will be tacking the passage of time as a singular body, reacting to set meditations on human relation to wilderness, leaving traces of my movement through chalk. It feels radical in our fast-paced lives to suspend time and dedicate intention towards action, inciting an audience to have true presence and patience in their observation.”
Experience theater, music, installation, dance, poetry, video, etc. all presented in downtown Turners Falls in a variety of alternative venues like storefronts, repurposed churches, the Discovery Center, the Shea Theatre – all in walking distance. Tickets at Eggtooth.org or at the Shea on Fest. weekend.
One $20 ticket gets you into everything. This is everything: www.brownpapertickets.com/event/4101253.
Tickets are $20 and give access to all of the art for the whole weekend and are available at eggtooth.org. The art that will be presented is as follows and maps will be available at the festival to guide participants:
Ezekiel Baskin and Samuel Achilles Edwards – Queer Intimacies (working title); A short play exploring the complex beginnings of queer relationships through audience interaction. Great Falls Discover Center. 5:30 pm on rotation.
Vital. Vibrant. Visible: Local Indigenous Identity Through Portraiture, photography by Sara K. Lyons curated by Rhonda Anderson. Great Falls Discovery Center. Ongoing.
Julia Whalen, An immersive installation piece exploring childhood memory. Flourish. Ongoing.
Katherine Adler, “Artifacts of the Ephemeral” and will have two components. First, physical objects with corresponding meditative writings. Second, a 30-hour durational performance at St. Anne’s Church. 30 hours In the space will run Friday 26 at3 p.m.- Sat. 27 at 9 p.m.
Formerly incarcerated women of Voices from Inside, spoken word performance. Great Falls Discovery Center. 5:00 p.m.
Alex DeMelo, The United Arc Performing Arts Program presents theatrical performances by members of the United ARC, an organization that supports individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities in achieving the universal goals of inclusion, choice, and independence. Shea Theatre. 5:00 p.m.
Lori Holmes Clark, Cloudy, With a Chance of Fringe is a buoyant contemplation of Neurodiversity through Song and Dance by Broadway veteran and Local theatre maker, Lori Holmes Clark. Great Falls Discovery Center. 8 p.m.
Joe Dulude, In this installation piece, Joe is allowing the viewer to immerse themselves in the living room from his youth in the 1970s; exploring how his past has shaped the way he thinks about himself, who he is and where he came from. FAB 5-8 p.m.
Cynthia Snow with Kathy Steinem, A dance piece focusing on aging, dementia, and caregiving with poetry by Snow and Susie Patlove and the à Capella group Acapelagos. Shea Theatre. 6 PM Saturday only.
Karen Werner, a live experimental radio documentary performance, Strange Radio: Live documentary transmission on the layers of time, sound, and memory in Jewish Vienna. Strange Radio will be released on CD with an accompanying booklet in 2019. Church of Pod. 7-8 p.m.
Terry Jenoure, Pelala is Terry Jenoure’s solo performance of music, storytelling, and video that weaves a new fable for our day. Shea Theatre. 7 p.m. Saturday Only.
Supported by Mass Humanities, and the Mass Cultural Council Montague and Conway branches and Fostering Art and Culture and Turners Falls RiverCulture.
* Eggtooth Productions is proud to offer a follow-up panel discussion, workshop, & action plan on the Sunday, April 28, 2019 following the Radical Interconnectedness Festival on April 26-27, 2019 at the Cohn Commons at Greenfield Community College.
For the Festival, we have commissioned artists from marginalized communities whose narratives have been suppressed to create art that illuminates their stories in an experiential way. We have representative artists from the African American, Native American, Trans, Gay, Identity Questioning, Neurologically Different, & Developmentally Disabled communities and more.
We believe that when people experience real engagement with each other, see, hear, & feel the other’s intention and perceive their points of view, then true understanding begins. We believe Art has the power to hasten engagement through visceral experience that affects the participant in ways beyond the cognitive.
For the RadFest, Eggtooth sought proposals from artists to address the concerns of marginalized communities. They invited stories that engage issues of race, age, gender, religion, economic class, & those aspects of cultural identity that have been suppressed. Furthermore, they looked for a wide range of artistic expression including music, dance, theatrical, visual, immersive, installation & other forms.
