The Biographie of Service 12.14.16

.The Biographie of Service

'Biographie' combines my 20 years in customer service and figure modeling with audience participation and is my newest work in progress. Experienced and non experienced participants engage in a guided figure drawing class facilitated by a Teacher and Assistants and with me as the figure model. After several poses in silence, I begin to openly narrate my experience on being black, queer, immigrant and female, while working alongside my fellow artists on the front lines of customer service. Dialogue shifts to moments of public interaction after the 2016 election and restrategizing Life in the Trump-Era after my initial diagnosis of Lupus on December 14, 2016. As 'Biographie' continues evolving, I incorporate an opening ritual/demonstration and storytelling, while discussing my alter-ego Pirate Jenny and how her time traveling tools for navigating society as "Othered", are created.

'Biographie' developed from early EmergeNYC excercises exploring personal biography, and an earlier tender yet raw investigation of social practice and service within street theatre, 'Service is Cool' *.

Below: Biographie - Grace Exhibition Space, Brooklyn, NYC . Work in Progress exploring PJ's tool making as Performance.
Art Teacher - Linus Ignatius , Teacher Assistant - Heather Rose, Figure Model - Shola Cole; Photos: Grace Exhibition Space, NYC (May 2018)

Below: Video Stills: EmergeNYC , Works in Progress Night, La Mama Theater, NYC (June, 2017)
Photos by Hemispheric Institute: L - R: Anooj Bhandari, Ana Laura Ramirez; assistants/customer service hybrids, Effie NKrumah as Teacher

*I previously explored concepts of service dressed up as a boi scout while handing out water out and cooling aides to the passerby in 90 degree weather in NYC.