Joel Watson

Sat 12 Dec, 2026, 8pm

($17 - 12) All-Access

Valediction is dedicated to Jeremy Thorpe-Woods (May 6, 1959–October 14, 2026)

Saturday, December 12th at 8pm, 2026 Suzanne Fiol Curatorial Fellow Isabella Thorpe-Woods presents her culminating commission featuring artist Joel Watson. It’s fitting that Thorpe-Woods has titled her final program Valediction, an expression used to say farewell at the end of a correspondence, to bring her yearlong exploration of letters as a curatorial prompt to a close.

“Performance is inextricably bound to loss,” she writes. “Its very liveness predicates its inevitable, felt loss. Perhaps this is why a professor once told me to always write about performance in the present tense. It is also perhaps why it’s so tricky to know how to end a piece and why once the show is over, we grieve.”

Inspired by an ongoing conversation between Thorpe-Woods and Watson, Valediction examines the fear and delight of repetition, revision, and reference in the making of performance. Alongside the recent death of her father, Valediction considers what it means to say goodbye and then return: to the rehearsal, to the venue, to the archive, to the party, again and again and again — so as not to lose the loss. Through these faltering reattempts, we might bring past and future feelings and figures into the present, or allow something else to emerge entirely. And is there nothing more hopeful, compensatory and beautiful than such devotion?

Thorpe-Woods leaves us with the same parting prayer saved for her father, “I love you, good bye, I love you” and makes way for Watson to close-out with what he might describe as “His spine song. His final gouge. BANG. BANG. BANG. BANG.”

Joel Watson is a writer and performer who lives here. Recent work includes BO DIDDLEY WUZZA STEEL DRIVIN MAN!! , DESPERADO!! TAKE 1 & 2. And short film JET BLACK FUTURE!!

ISSUE Project Room is a pioneering nonprofit performance center, presenting projects by interdisciplinary artists that expand the boundaries of artistic practice and stimulate critical dialogue in the broader community. ISSUE serves as a leading cultural incubator, facilitating the commission and premiere of innovative new works.

Since its inception in 2003 under the vision of late Founder Suzanne Fiol, ISSUE has evolved from a small East Village garage, to a grain silo on the Gowanus Canal, to a project space in The Old American Can Factory, to now owning our 22 Boerum Place theater as an internationally-recognized leader for fostering experimental cross-disciplinary performance.

The Suzanne Fiol Curatorial Fellowship supports emerging curators in realizing ambitious new projects that will significantly transform their own artistic practice, move their work in new directions, and enable them to gain exposure to a broader audience. In its fifth year, ISSUE’s Curatorial Fellowship commissions emerging New York curators to organize challenging projects, serving a central role in fulfilling ISSUE’s mission to support and cultivate innovative art within the local community.

ISSUE Project Room's Curatorial Fellowship program is supported, in part, by TD Charitable Foundation, by public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature, and by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

For visitors requiring accessible access for the performance, ISSUE Project Room’s 22 Boerum Pl. theater is ADA accessible by lift and a ramp funded through the Accessibility Project of Downtown Brooklyn Partnership’s Downtown Revitalization Initiative Placemaking Fund.

Joel Watson

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Suzanne Fiol Curatorial Fellowship 2026