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The Stealing of the Kine

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Last week in Philadelphia, in the Conwell Dance Theater at Temple University, Wolf-in-Skins (a dance-opera I have been designing with co-creators Christopher Williams and Gregory Spears) had it’s avant-premiere showing of act one. My costume designs for the opera’s supernatural characters made their first appearance on stage. Many thanks to an amazingly gifted cast of dancers and singers who transformed and transported us to netherworld realms.

I had my camera with me during the dress rehearsal. Here are some photos of my costume designs for the race of the “Fay.”

Gwrgi, Bleiddwen, Gwyddrud and Gwydden (Matthew Flatley, Kira Blazek, Jordan Isadore and Steven Zarzecki)

Gwrgi, Bleiddwen, Gwyddrud and Gwydden (Matthew Flatley, Kira Blazek, Jordan Isadore and Steven Zarzecki) _  photo: AndyToad

Llaethwen, Llaethenwen and Maiddwen (Chelsea Retzloff, Caitlin Scranton and Andrew Champlin)

Llaethwen, Llaethenwen and Maiddwen (Chelsea Retzloff, Caitlin Scranton and Andrew Champlin) _  photo: AndyToad

A pack of wolves and hounds

A pack of wolves and hounds _ photo: AndyToad

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See more photos here.

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 As for the future of Wolf-in-Skins, we will continue working on its second act this year, and the complete dance-opera is slated for debut in New York City in 2014. More info as it develops

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Watermill Center Residency with Christopher Williams

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Watermill Center   _   photo: Gregory Spears

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Recently I returned from a week long stay at The Watermill Center where I was in residence with Christopher Williams and Gregory Spears working on our upcoming “dance-opera” Wolf-in-Skins. During our time there we worked to further develop the choreography, music, and designs for Wolf-in-Skins. Watermill provided an enriching experience, an awesome opportunity to be amongst my collaborators for an extended amount of time and to focus on our work. In an amazing space. (Thank you Watermill!)

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The Knee at Watermill Center   _   photo: Gregory Spears

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In my studio space at Watermill  _   photo: Gregory Spears

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The Watermill Center’s large collection of world masks, objects and photographs offered me much inspiration as did exploring the library’s vast book collection. I spent the majority of my time at the center sketching, planning and refining the costume designs for the race of The Fay and The Hounds of The Fay (both played by dancers), and the Ellyllon (played by opera singers).

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Friends in my studio  _   photos: AndyToad

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The sacrifice totems  _   photos: AndyToad

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Some sketches by AndyToad

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Ellyllon shapes by AndyToad

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In conceptualizing the costume design Christopher and I have set some guidelines for the look of these primordial characters. The Fay come from a time of mystery and elegant magical craft whose history has trickled down to us through myth. The time of the Fay roughly corresponds to our geological time period known as the Stone Age.

The Ellyllon are very ancient elemental entities, older than The Fay. The Ellyllon are the storytellers, the voices guiding the narrative. They are Shapes and shadows in the process of forming and un-forming.

The aforementioned races exist in a time prior to human mastery of fabric and tailoring. The Fay and Ellyllon “garments” are more hide and skin-like – shells, vegetation, skin, bone, teeth, amber… organic and manifested in unknown ways.

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Costume Textures   _   photo: AndToad

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Hound mask in progress  _   photo: AndyToad

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Christopher with dancers Matthew Flatley and Caitlin Scranton  _   photo: AndyToad

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Wolf-in-Skins in progress showing  _   photo: Jake Schlichting

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Wolf-in-Skins in progress showing  _   photo: Jake Schlichting

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Observing a hound in progress  _   photo: Jake Schlichting

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Hound in progress  _   photo: Jake Schlichting

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Your Autumn Lips

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It’s been busy around here.

I crammed a lot into the end of October (a little too much I’m over worked and under the weather).

On October 21st I participated in an performance event at the Location One Gallery.

The evening was curated by my friend David Quinn who asked various people from around town involved in the performing arts to participate in a fundraising event for Location One. I took it as an opportunity to flesh out some ideas that I’d been kicking around in my head. The result was three short solo performances in which I performed, choreographed and designed (costumes and projections.) All of this was only possible because of the amazing people in my life who agreed to work with me on the project – My artist muses/collaborators – Cori Olinghouse, Christopher Williams and Mike Andrews. Composer Derek Piotr built gorgeous soundscapes for each of the three chapters. The fantastic costume and knitting skills of Craig Hunter and Kit Lee helped me realize the looks for the pieces with some rad accessories by Sam McFadden. And generous friends gave of their time to form the video projections – Grant Worth as editor and performers Ananda Keator, Betty Chen, Felipe Vasquez, Kit Lee, Nathan Crislip, Raja Kelly, and Will Penrose. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you. You all amaze me.

Unfortunately because I was quite distracted I didn’t arrange to have someone document the performances …  I plan to re-stage these pieces for documentation. More on this project soon. In the meantime more info can be read here.

Below is an excerpt from the video projection, which acted as my set, that ran during the third sequence – “Raven”.

[vimeo http://www.vimeo.com/31707180 w=700&h=394]

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Below are photographs I shot for my friend and collaborator Christopher Williams last week. The photographs are for the Wolf-in-Skins opera project that we are working on together. The dancers pictured are Burr Johnson and Kira Blazek . Choreography by Christopher Williams.

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Then of course it was Halloween, and it’s hard for me to just brush that off. A delightfully successful collaboration with the exquisite Jordan Isadore led to a Dia de los Muertos couple (all paper and and paint). ¡Guapísimo!

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In the moments between the aforementioned projects I tried to put in as much time as I could at my freelance job at Izquierdo Studio (which is always busy at Halloween). Martin Izquierdo has designed Heidi Klum’s Halloween costume for years and this year was no exception. Actually this year he designed her two! The Skinless Woman and The Missing Link between man and ape.
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Spells

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A sneak peek at designs from a work in progress.
Photography courtesy of Phillip Romano
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I suppose the official sneak peak was in February at the Harkness Dance Festival where an excerpt from this yet untitled project was shown. Here are some studio photos (thank you Phillip) of an exciting piece that is developing, a collaboration with my friend Christopher Williams.

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…… Choreography and Direction by Christopher Williams
…… Music (Bird-Curse Aria) composed by Gregory Spears
…… Costume Design by Andrew Jordan
…… Dancers pictured: Kira Blazek, Burr Johnson

…… More images/info coming soon.

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voyage

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The Voyage of Garbhglas

Images on my flickr from my friend Christopher’s piece at the Irish Hunger Memorial earlier this month. Carol Binion did the fantastic costumes and I coordinated them for this show. It was a wonder to see winged faeries and “protuberance” demons dancing in Lower Manhattan. Most of these photos I took but there are also some from Michael Wang and James Wagner.

Photography Feature

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Jamaica Center for Arts and Learning

I recently finished teaching a digital photography class at an all girls school in Queens. Once a week I would hang out with the ladies and we’d go on photo adventures. Below are some picks from our work together:


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Christopher Williams
My friend Christopher, some friends and I organized a photo shoot at the Irish Hunger Memorial last month. The images are to be used to advertise a dance piece, The Voyage of Garbhglas, that Christopher is staging at the memorial in August. I’ll also be designing some costumes for the piece. The model is dancer Michael Ingle who will be performing in the piece. Some of the images I shot:

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Grant Worth
Back during Easter-time my friend Grant organized an event – The Easter Glamour Portrait Studio x2 – Spring Forward – The Future of Spring 2010
I assisted in styling the attendees along with the sparkling Destiny Pierce and shimmering Stina Puotinen. Grant then shot portraits of the guests with Polaroid film. Here are some favorites:

The complete experience can be had here:
http://www.missionfantastic.com/polaroid.html

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Reliquaries and Mother Goddess Figures

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I have reliquaries and “venus” figures on the brain…

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Studio shot of the paper mache reliquaries in process

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4vyF8xVBBY&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

Christopher working on the inside of “Flosshilde.”

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A few days ago I took a trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to do research.

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Outer Coffin of Kharushere

Virgin and Child Reliquary, French, 1170-1200

The Visitation, German, 1310-20

Bust of Saint Yrieix, French, 1220-40 (Made to house his skull)

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Voluptuous ladies from the past, your silhouettes still inspire.

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Venus of Lespugue (resides in France, at the Musée de l’Homme)

Venus of Willendorf (resides in Austria, at the Naturhistorisches Museum)

A Mother Goddess (resides in Turkey, at the Ankara Museum)


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