When the Gloves Come Off
Fill out the form attached to reserve your spot.
Your participation in any of these workshops is a contribution to the larger public artwork and exhibition, “When the Gloves Come Off.” This project seeks to subvert the Cotillion and Debutante Ball traditions through performance, protest aesthetics, and community engagement.
Various iterations of this work and workshops connect audiences in Maine and Alabama resulting in an exhibition that implicates both regions despite the expectation these events are exclusive to the Southeast.
In scrutinizing these traditions we begin to expose how whiteness behaves, by way of, cultivating spaces of racial homogeneity and wealth or prioritizing aesthetics of conformity over self-expression. The visual language of this project is anti-cohesion and maximalist, through this aesthetic of unacceptability, a counter form of pageantry is proposed, one related to the celebratory and emancipatory culture of drag, persona, and mythmaking.
“When the Gloves Come Off” will include a live performance, consisting of a catwalk choreographed dance routine. The components of which are developed from the movements identified in The Strike A Pose Photography Workshop and both of the Collaborative Choreography Workshops hosted this fall.
Participants in the fall workshops are not expected to perform during the final exhibition however they are invited to. And those unable to attend the workshops are still welcome to participate in the culminating performance if of interest.
The final performance and exhibition aim to cultivate a celebratory space that honors the intersections of our identity, and the uniqueness of our experiences as well as providing an opportunity for skill sharing and community building.
10/20 Strike a Pose | Photography Workshop
Drop by my studio, room 111 from 11-4 pm, for a free festive-themed portrait session. Gain your new headshot and contribute a movement to our growing dance routine.
10/27 Collaborative Choreography Workshop 1
Return to Lincoln Street, from 12-3 pm, for a free dance workshop. Participants will work as a cohort to develop a section of choreography integrated into a future performance. This workshop is led by artists with limited dance experience and participants of any dance level are welcome.
11/3 Collaborative Choreography Workshop 2
For those who missed the first opportunity or want to continue collaborating, join us again at Lincoln Street, from 12-3 pm, for the final dance workshop. Participants will have the opportunity to build off movement suggestions from the previous cohort while offering their own recommendations. This workshop is led by artists with limited dance experience and participants of any dance level are welcome.
All workshops take place on Wabanaki Confederacy Land in Rockland, Maine at @lincolnstreetcenter and are open to Southerners living in New England or rural Maine residents 18 years or older.
Participants in either of the Collaborative Choreography Workshops will be compensated for their time. Each workshop has a capacity of 15. The dance workshops are led by artists with limited dance experience and participants of any dance level are welcome. Those interested in the Strike a Pose Photography Workshop can access copies of their headshots online and capacity is flexible.
Fill out the form attached to reserve your spot.
