10/23/2009: MICHELE BECK, JORGE CALVO, JENNIFER BARTLETT & BILL KUSHNER.

Friday, October 23rd

10PM - MIDNIGHT

$8 General / $7 Students & Seniors / $5 or FREE for Members

JOIN US FOR THE SCREENING OF TWO FILMS BY MICHELE BECK & JORGE CALVO ABOUT THE LIVES OF TWO POETS -- BILL KUSHNER & JENNIFER BARTLETT. THE SCREENINGS WILL BE FOLLOWED BY A PERFORMANCE BY BECK & CALVO, AS WELL AS A READING BY JENNIFER BARTLETT & SPECIAL GUEST BILL KUSHNER.

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ABOUT THE FILMS/PERFORMANCE FROM BECK & CALVO:

"The films about Bill Kushner and Jennifer Bartlett come out of series of videos called "Video Portraits in a Day" that we have been creating over the past couple of years. The actual interviews for these videos are usually quite short- just a couple of hours in one day or perhaps we will meet for a few more hours another day, but not more than that. Our interest is to see what we can capture of a person's essence in these short visits. For both Bill and Jen, we met them at their homes, had them read their poetry, followed them for some of their daily routine and asked them to speak about their work. The editing of the footage is a key element in these videos, reflecting each subject's different rhythm, timing and character."

"The performance we want to do is part of an evolution of performances we have been doing in conjunction with our performance-based video work. For this performance we will be wearing full bodied costumes of white stretching fabric. The costume is a kind of amorphous bag covering our bodies. We will speak into the microphones and our voices will be processed live. In this performance, like most of our performances, we are creating an unconscious atmosphere. In honor of our poets, we want to use words."

Michele Beck (USA) and Jorge Calvo (Costa Rica) are multidisciplinary artists working with video, sound and performance. Michele and Jorge met in New York City in December 1998 and have been working together ever since. They are recipients of the Manhattan Community Arts Fund Grant and an SOS grant from the New York Foundation for the Arts. Michele and Jorge have shown their work nationally and internationally at venues including The ICA in London, The Blaffer Gallery at The Art Museum at the University of Texas Museum, Galerie Chez Valentin in Paris, France, The Bronx Museum, and The Queens Museum of Art.

Michele completed her Bachelors in Art History at New York University and Masters of Fine Arts at Parsons School of Design. She teaches at the New School University and the International Center for Photography. Jorge pursued his studies in experimental theatre in Sydney, Australia. After finishing his training, he performed with the alternative theatre companies G.R.O.U.P and Dangerous Visions Theatre, both of which received funding from the Australian Arts Council. He works as a sound designer for film and video.

To see some of their work visit here.

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Jennifer Bartlett was a 2005 NYFA Poetry Fellow. Bartlett is the author of Derivative of the Moving Image (UNM 2007) and (a) lullaby without any music (forthcoming). Individual poems have recently appeared in New American Writing and The Raleigh Quarterly. In 2008, she curated a collection on mentorship for How2. She is currently working on a project on the life and work of Larry Eigner. Bartlett teaches poetry to students with disabilities at United Cerebral Palsy and lives in Greenpoint Brooklyn with the science fiction writer Jim Stewart and their son, Jeffrey.

Bill Kushner is the author of Night Fishing, Love Uncut, He Dreams of Rivers, That April, In The Hairy Arms of Whitmanand In Sunsetland With You. His works have been awarded the Dylan Thomas Prize For Poetry and have appeared in numerous anthologies, including In Out Time: The Gay and Lesbian Anthology, Poetry After 9/11: An Anthology of New York Poets and Best American Poetry 2002. He has been a 1999 and 2005 Fellow of the New York Foundation of the Arts.