FringeArts 2018 and the Philadelphia Fringe Festival was on the forefront of contemporary performances in Philadelphia. Following theater and dance became a driving force to the emergence of acting styles, genre scene, and classical fashion in the volumes of sketchbooks drawn to the stage, made in the audience of diverse performers in the art and culture.
Séance
Jaamil Olawale Kosoko
Tania El Khoury
Gardens Speak
How much do we know about the ongoing massacres of the civil war in Syria? How much do we comprehend about the tragedies of more than five million refugees and innumerable martyrs – or “shuhada” – in this blood-fueled fight?
In “Gardens Speak,” Tania El Khoury takes a different approach to intervention, setting aside graphic visuals we may encounter in the media. The installation is an auditory and sensory encounter with tragedy in its rawest form. El Khoury rejects the traditional channels that have failed to speak for Syrian communities. Instead, she hands over the narrative to the voices beneath the ground – to those who took their stories to the grave.
An investigation of performing artists during 2018, in theater and dance illuminated the arts. For instance, NextMove Dance a series at The Prince Theater welcomed press for Phindie author, Chuck Schultz to sketch throughout that year. Then, in 2021, I designed a visual review of Dorrance Dance at Penn Arts Live. Ella’quent Holiday Swing.
NextMove Dance
The influence of Dance by this time tied themes, and many different forms to a continuation of diverse performance styles.
Hervé Koubi
Blend of Arabic and French dance influences explored aerobatic and street performing styles. The Algerian choreographer explains an autoethnogaphic search into his family history
October 2017
Ronald K Brown/ Evidence
Hip-hop, African and Caribbean movement philosophies, moves the spirit with high energy with gospel and spirituals.
December 2017
Hervé Koubi, What The Day Owes To The Night, 2017.
When NextMove Dance introduced the choreographers of difference dance companies it left an impression on the way we think about dance. Beginning with the lecture of where, and how their art form in dance originated raised its own level of intrigue.
2017 EgoPo Classic Theater |Abrahamse & Meyer Productions (Cape Town, South Africa), co-presented with Drexel University
DESIRE UNDER THE ELM written by Eugene O’neill
An emphasis on learning new forms, and languages with drawing observational sketches. The research showed depth about the programs, and presented eclectic art forms. During this time, from 2016-2018. I was a liberal arts student at the University of Pennsylvania.
The creative community felt welcoming to my curiosity in all these production teams I was interested in the collective work of theater programs, dancers, and American politics. In context, such as EgoPo Classic Theater’s season in partnership with South African company, Abrahamse & Meyer.
It is simply a familiarity that grows from exposing troubling subject matter to audiences of some of the organizations working in the field of art and culture.
A Human Being Died That Night by Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela, adaptation by Nicholas Wright, directed by Steven Wright.
Censored: “Master Harold”…and the Boys by Athol Fugard, directed by Lne Savadove