Kimberly, I'm sorry about the hasty reply I gave you! And the fact that I am going to use this opportunity to write a blog entry for my website WHILST responding to you, bodacious being.

So in a nutshell, this piece we are developing is a vignette within a larger creative work called Meat Space Diaries, an accumulating performance work that looks at relationships through the lens of agriculture and meat production. I was lucky to get to know 10 pigs that were being raised for meat in Proctor AR, and that experience inspired me to take a closer look at America's relationships to the actual labor that goes into their consumption requirements and preferences, and how casually we turn a blind eye to what is actually a very intimate, perhaps even graphic and certainly quite meaningful step-by-step process.

For this 14-minute scored improvisation, called ODE, I am collaborating with Nat and Bethany (and you?) to give viewers some insight into the dynamics in play when farmers 'herd' an animal to new pastures. On the farm this was always an utterly entertaining spectacle, and quite touching to participate in. This piece is a bit of a 'riff' off of that idea while still endeavoring constantly to keep true to the ambiguous role played by all the parties in situations of animal husbandry. Then, of course, it turns into a bit of tongue-in-cheek revelry--bittersweet revelry I think... :-)

Anyway, I hope this piques your interest. I would love your eyes; and if I can have more I'd love your body too! :-) We only have one more rehearsal, so we could try 'teaching' you the score, which would be great practice for me because in Portland, I have to fill two of the parts with new cast on the DAY OF the performance, so the score needs to be translatable for a new person.

Please holler any questions or initial thoughts, or just let me know YAY or NAY to:
Saturday July 11 12-2pm work=through: watch or jump in
Saturday July 18 4-5pm attend the showing and perhaps facilitate feedback if you are interested
Location: Living Hope enormous gym sanctuary at 815 North McLean

Big hugs and much gratitude for your consideration dear.
S.

Friends, Bethany Wells Bak, Nat Newburger and I are shaping up "Meat Space Diaries #4: ODE" for its premiere at the Body Mind Centering Association's North American Conference on July 23 in Portland Oregon. This piece of the larger work investigates the relationships created by agricultural practices. In particular, the relationship between the herded and the herder. 

We met in Living Hope's "gymtuary" space last Saturday, an enormous gym space lit by huge windows, 50 foot ceilings, and all the room we could hope for was ours.

I've just cast a colleague from my days at St. Mary's school, Maesie Speere. We performed in TROJAN WOMEN when we were 16 and 17, she was Hecuba and I was Andromache. WHAT A HOOT!!

more to come...