Emily Johnson presents "SHORE" - a multiday performance installation of dance, story, volunteerism, and feasting

Company:
EMILY JOHNSON/CATALYST
NEW YORK LIVE ARTS PRESENTS
EMILY JOHNSON/CATALYST’S SHORE IN LENAPEHOKING (NEW YORK CITY)
A MULTI-DAY PERFORMANCE INSTALLATION OF DANCE, STORY, VOLUNTEERISM, AND FEASTING
PRODUCED AND PRESENTED IN ASSOCIATION WITH EMILY JOHNSON/CATALYST
APRIL 19–26, 2015
Updated: April 6, 2015 – Emily Johnson/Catalyst brings its expansive installation SHORE to Lenapehoking (New York City). SHORE is the third part of a trilogy exploring the intricate terrain of identity, memory, ancestry, land, and community. Building on these themes, SHORE brings ideas and questions that emerged in the first two works—the Bessie Award-winning The Thank-you Bar (2011) and the richly layered Niicugni (2013)—out into the world. Throughout the trilogy, Johnson has asked: How can performance uniquely connect us to our land, our lives, and each other? SHORE’s gatherings and events will take place at various locations April 19–26, with performances at New York Live Arts April 23–25.
SHORE celebrates the places where we meet and merge—land and water, performer and audience, art and community, past, present, and future. It is created in four equal parts: SHORE: Community Action (volunteerism)—a series of community work sessions in the Rockaways and on Governors Island involving the caretaking of land and water and dune restoration; SHORE: Story, a curated reading featuring local authors; SHORE: Performance, a work that combines movement, storytelling; and live music; conceived and choreographed by Emily Johnson, directed by Ain Gordon, and performed by Johnson with dancer/collaborators Aretha Aoki, Krista Langberg, and Julia Bither, vocalist Christina Courtin, the SHORE Choir, and a large cast of local dancers; and SHORE: Feast, a culminating potluck celebration in which participants share stories and the recipes of the dishes they bring to share.
Partners for SHORE include The Lenape Center, New York Live Arts, Gibney Dance, Creative Capital, The MAP Fund, The Rockaway Waterfront Alliance, Billion Oyster Project/Harbor School, Two Bridges Neighborhood Council, North Brooklyn Boat Club, Iliamna Fish Co. Traditional Wild Red Salmon, Open Oyster, Metropolitan Waterfront Alliance, Broadbent, Belladonna, Red Lantern Bicycles, Arts by The People, Native Arts and Cultures Foundation, and Jack Tchen and Asian/Pacific/American Institute at New York University.
SHORE in Lenapehoking is part of a five-city tour that began in Minneapolis in June 2014 in partnership with the University of Minnesota/Northrop. Following the New York the engagement in April, SHORE will be presented in Homer, Alaska, in partnership with Bunnell St. Arts Center (June 2015); in San Francisco, in partnership with ODC (August 2015); and in Seattle, in partnership with On the Boards (October 2015). The project takes new shape in each city in collaboration with the presenter and many community partners.
SHORE’s Schedule of Events in Lenapehoking (New York City):
SHORE: COMMUNITY ACTION in the Rockaways
Sunday, April 19, 11am–3pm
Meet at Firehouse 59
5803 Rockaway Beach Blvd, Rockaway, NY
Free
A series of community work sessions in the Rockaways culminates in a celebration and caretaking of the land and water. Join Catalyst for a dune restoration planting project on the shoreline. Designed with youth leaders from the Rockaways who care deeply about the land they live on. This day of community action includes working together, a story-walk, and sharing food.
In partnership with Emily Johnson/Catalyst, Gibney Dance, The Lenape Center, and the Rockaway Waterfront Alliance
SHORE: STORY (curated reading), Lower East Side
Sunday April 19, 6pm
Two Bridges Neighborhood Council, Goldie Chu Community Room
82 Rutgers Slip, 2nd Floor, New York, NY
Free
Local writers, their perspectives, stories, and poems have a prominent place within SHORE in this curated reading featuring original work relating to home, place, and land. The infinite associations, connections, and disconnections people have with, to, and from these sites are conjured in the moment of the reading and create a shifting, localized context for our stories, memories, and own definitions of home.
Curated by Emily Johnson; featuring Ben Weaver, Sahar Muradi, Chris Moore, Emmanuel Iduma, Tim Carrier, and Live Lines - a lively group of young poets from Two Bridges.
In partnership with Emily Johnson/Catalyst, The Lenape Center, and Two Bridges Neighborhood Council.
SHORE: PERFORMANCE presented by New York Live Arts, Chelsea
Thursday–Saturday, April 23–25, 7:30pm
Performance begins on the basketball court at PS 11, 320 West 21st Street, between 8th and 9th Avenues
New York Live Arts, 219 West 19th Street, between 7th and 8th Avenues, New York, NY
Tickets start at $30 / select $15 seats available
SHORE: Performance begins outside at PS 11 and makes its way to the theater at New York Live Arts. Combining dance, live music, and storytelling, the work “dwell[s] in the liminal space between memoir and dream, intimate and mythical, dance and installation, continually working away at the boundaries between performers and audience” (SHORE essayist Eleanor Savage). SHORE is conceived and choreographed by Emily Johnson and directed by Ain Gordon. The work is performed by Johnson with dancer/collaborators Aretha Aoki, Krista Langberg, and Julia Bither, vocalist Christina Courtin, the SHORE Choir, and a large cast of local dancers. Music is composed by James Everest and Nona Marie Invie with musician Fletcher Barnhill. Lighting design is by Heidi Eckwall and costumes are by Angie Vo.
In partnership with Emily Johnson/Catalyst, New York Live Arts, and The Lenape Center
SHORE: COMMUNITY ACTION on Governors Island
Friday, April 24, 11am–4:30pm (meet at 10:45am)
Meet at 10 South Street/ Battery Maritime Building
Free (limited to 30 participants)
Help restore the harbor through the reintroduction of oysters, an indigenous species of Lenapehoking. Oysters and oyster reefs improve water quality and are one of the most biologically productive, diverse, and dynamic environments on the planet. This event includes cleaning oyster shells, working on boats, and an introduction to the New York Harbor School’s Billion Oyster Project, whose mission is to help reintroduce one billion oysters into the bay by 2030.
In partnership with Emily Johnson/Catalyst, Gibney Dance, The Lenape Center, and The New York Harbor School’s Billion Oyster Project
SHORE: FEAST (potluck celebration), on Newtown Creek in Greenpoint
Sunday, April 26, 2pm–6pm
North Brooklyn Boat Club
49 Ash Street at McGuinness Blvd, Brooklyn, NY
Under the Pulaski Bridge, on Newtown Creek (outdoor event, please dress for the weather)
Free
Join Catalyst for a celebratory potluck feast. Bring a dish to share that has a special meaning or story behind it and the recipe. The feast will include Wild Alaskan Salmon from Iliamna Fish Company, cooked on an open fire, oysters from Open Oyster, shucked by a team, and wine from Broadbent. Live music by Ben Weaver. The collected recipes and stories will be compiled in the SHORE zine, vol. 5 and mailed to all participants.
North Brooklyn Boat Club is offering environmental education programming to explore the unique history and returning ecology of Newtown Creek as well as free guide-led canoe tours of the Creek.
In partnership with Emily Johnson/Catalyst, The Lenape Center, The North Brooklyn Boat Club, Iliamna Fish Co., and Broadbent.
About Emily Johnson/Catalyst:
Emily Johnson is an artist who makes body-based work. Originally from Alaska, she is currently based in Minneapolis. Since 1998 Johnson has been creating richly layered works that blur distinctions between performance and daily life. Her dances function as installations, engaging audiences within and through a space and environment—interacting with a place's architecture, history, and role in community.
Johnson is a fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) at the University of Minnesota. Her fellowship has corresponded with the development of SHORE. Her position in the IAS has been focused on the development of research strategies and writing about her integrated process of art-making and community activism. The collaborative presentations and discussions with her fellow colleagues at IAS have been instrumental in the development of a research model that honors artistic process and values the generation of good energy. Johnson’s research is around and about the creation, presentation, and effects of SHORE and she is working with the honors department to develop a volunteer and research team who will continue to work with her next year as she reports on her research thus far and brings SHORE residencies to communities in Minnesota and throughout the U.S.
Johnson is a recipient of a 2014 Doris Duke Artist Award. Her work is currently supported by Creative Capital, Native Arts and Cultures Foundation, MAP Fund, a Joyce Award, the McKnight Foundation, and the Doris Duke Residency to Build Demand for the Arts. Johnson is a 2014 Fellow at the Robert Rauschenberg Residency, a 2012 Headlands Center for the Arts and MacDowell Artist in Residence, a Native Arts and Cultures Fellow for 2011, a MANCC Choreographer Fellow (2009, 2010, 2012, 2014, 2016), a MAP Fund grant recipient (2009, 2010, 2012, and 2013), and a 2009 McKnight Fellow. She received a 2012 New York Dance and Performance “Bessie” Award for Outstanding Performance for her work The Thank-you Bar at New York Live Arts.
For more information about SHORE, visit: www.catalystdance.com.
Funding Credits for SHORE:
SHORE is a project of Creative Capital and Native Arts and Cultures Foundation, Inc. SHORE is made with support from The McKnight Foundation, a Joyce Award, Carolyn Foundation, and MAP Fund, a program of Creative Capital supported by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. SHORE has been supported by residencies at the Maggie Allesee National Center for Choreography and the Robert Rauschenberg Residency. Research for SHORE is supported by a grant from the Doris Duke Foundation to Build Demand for the Arts. SHORE is supported by a National Dance Project Touring Award from the New England Foundation for the Arts.
SHORE in New York is made possible by the New England Foundation for the Arts’ National Dance Project, with lead funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, with additional support from the National Endowment for the Arts.