Saturday, May 11th at 7:30pm, ISSUE is pleased to co-present a salon with SPRING/BREAK Art Show centered on performance works from the Jo Andres Archive. A performance lecture beginning at 7:30pm followed by a reception will take place at 32 Prince Street, hosted by Cuban American interdisciplinary artist Stephanie Acosta, choreographer and multidisciplinary artist Laurie Berg, plus special guests.
Jo Andres: Before Your Eyes is the first expansive exhibition of the life and works of the artist. Filmmaker and choreographer - amongst her many titles - Andres tackled the magical, the symbolic, the material and the ephemeral to create works before your eyes. Visit 32 Prince Street, May 2nd-15th for two floors of video, installation, paintings, image capture and archived ephemera spanning a prolific 40-year career.
Jo Andres first became known on the kinetic downtown New York performance scene of the 1980s for her film/dance/light performances, shown at the reigning venues of the era, among them The Performing Garage, La Mama E.T.C., P.S. 122, St. Marks Danspace, and the Collective for Living Cinema. Black Kites, Andres’ 1996 award-winning film, aired on PBS, RAI Italian TV and screened in Sundance, Berlin, Toronto, London and Human Rights Watch Film Festivals. Andres directed music and art videos, as well as her own film performance works. Andres was a dance consultant to the acclaimed Wooster Group. She has been an artist in residence at leading universities, museums and art colonies, including Yaddo and The Rockefeller Study Center in Bellagio, Italy.
Stephanie Acosta is an interdisciplinary artist who places the materiality of the ephemeral at the center of her practice, questioning meaning-making and manufactured limitations. Acosta blends performance with practice-based research, making work in response to, while also creating, site and space. Engaging ensembles in facilitated processes, she creates fleeting performance works that challenge site, space, and perception to bring about shared experiences. Acosta has produced and presented works with and for Museum of Art and Design, Museum of Contemporary Art of Chicago, Knockdown Center, the Current Sessions, Miami Performance International Festival, Anatomy Collective, IN>Time Symposium, the Chicago Park District, the Performance Philosophy conference, High Concept Labs, Read/Write Library, No Media, and Radius. In her continued commitment to the experimental voices of New York and Chicago's performance art communities, Acosta has also collaborated with artists such as Miguel Gutierrez, Daviel Shy, Mark Jeffery and Judd Morrissey of ATOM-r, as well as performance artist Robin Deacon, sonic artist Jeff Kolar, and lead discourse at American Realness 2018. A Cuban American born and raised in Miami, Florida, and currently residing in Brooklyn, Acosta works extensively with unseen histories, performance, experimental radio, and film.
Whether working with dance and performance, collage, or jewelry, Laurie Berg creates performances that feel like living collages. Her choreographic work has been commissioned and presented by The Chocolate Factory Theater, Danspace Project, Roulette Intermedium, Times Square Arts, The Kitchen, Dixon Place, Beach Sessions Dance Series, and Movement Research among others. Berg was a 2020-2021 Movement Research Parent Artist Resident supported by The Sustainable Arts Foundation, a 2016-17 LMCC Workspace Artist-In-Residence, the 2016 recipient of the Tom Murrin Performance Award, a 2013 New York Live Arts Studio Series Artist and a 2010 Movement Research Artist-In-Residence. Berg was co-organizer of the performance platform AUNTS (2009-2021), and is now working on an AUNTS archive. The first research/collection events for the archive took place in June 2023 as part of LMCC’s R2R festival. Berg is the director of the nonprofit organization Before Your Eyes, Inc.
Miriam Gabriel is a performer and creator in both dance and film. She is also a full time dance educator at PS199Q. miriamgabriel.com
Lena Engelstein is a dancer, performer, and choreographer. Her work, called “The High Weird” by critics and lauded as “subtly campy and hilariously queer” by the Brooklyn Rail, has been presented in NYC dance and theater festivals such as Prelude, Exponential Festival, and Fresh Tracks. She is part of the interdisciplinary performance collective CHILD, headed by Lisa Fagan. Since 2020, Engelstein has collaborated with Jo Warren, Miguel Alejandro Castillo, and Magda San Millan on new works. Other recent performance credits include: Alexa West, Barnett Cohen, Brendan Drake, Falcon Dance (company member, 2018-present), Owen Prum + Lili Dekker, and Third Rail Company’s Then She Fell (company member, 2019-2020). She choreographs for and performs with the band Lou Tides. She has taught at SUNY Brockport, Colorado Mesa University, Bard College, and The Field Center. Lena holds a B.A. in Mathematics from Colorado College.
