Musical Theatre of the Future

In February 2017 I went to Norway to talk to experimental LARP designers about making a participatory space musical. I got to share a lot of my beliefs about musicals, participatory theater and transforming the civic sphere with art. You can watch:

Watch it on YouTube
Also check out Lizzie Stark's primer on Nordic Larp HERE.

Artists: What are you spending your time on?

My dad blew my mind last night with what's called a Dual-Bottom-Line Matrix. This is a table that typically helps non-profits evaluate their various activities and develop their sustainability. It works great for artists too though. Because as artists we are mostly pursuing a mission (fulfilling career) rather than a bottom line, and we do a million different things in pursuit of that mission. Here's how it works:

• Some of the things we do earn us money and exemplify our goals as artists (Stars).
• Some of our activities are wonderful opportunities that pay us nothing but are totally worth it (Hearts).
• Some things we do have nothing to do with our mission but bring us cash and fund the Hearts (Money Trees).
• And then there are the low mission low profit activities (Stop Sign). These might be favors, obligations, projects that have gone south, etc..
• Also different activities fall all over the place in the matrix, and some activities might transform over time. For example my heart has recently turned into my star.

The goal is that everything is eventually a star or a heart but the nice thing about this matrix is that it allows for the complexity that is inherent in pursuing a mission oriented career. Weed out the stop signs, maximize the money trees and cultivate the stars and hearts. Ain't life grand? Thanks dad.

Photo Credit

Are We at the Movies? - The Movie

Are We at the Movies?
Release Date: May 17, 2011 (Extropian Records)

thelisps.com
facebook.com/​thelisps
extropian.org

Directed by The Lisps & Pamela Romanowsky
Art Direction by Emily Orling
Edited by Nick Patten
Cameras - Pamela Romanowsky and Ben Chace
PAs - Stephanie Eiss, Conrad Kluck and Mark Rutan

The Lisps: César Alvarez, Lorenzo Wolff, Eric Farber, Sammy Tunis

Human Theremin - Lady Rizo
Burlesque - Lil' Miss Lixx
Tap Dancing - Sylvia Chen
Salsa Dancing - Contra-Tiempo
Puppeteer - Jason Rabinowitz
Hangman - Andrew Hoepfner and Leah Hayes
Couple Making Out - Dan Fishback and Santiago Venegas

Lady Rizo's gowns by Marchesa

Contra-Tiempo: Ana Maria Alvarez, Bianca Blanco, Jasmine Burgos, Mike Butler, Cesar Garfiaz, Marina Magalhães, Richie Marin, Omar Rodriguez-Diaz

Additional Revelers: Leola Bermanzohn, Stephanie Eiss, Radio Halfar, Paula Kadanoff, Jeri Keimig, Conrad Kluck, Dani Leventhal, Adepero Oduye, Elias Orling, Brett Price, Latasha Pugh, and Tina Vasquez

Refresh - Performance at The New Museum

Kristin Lucas 2007 – 6 sections: newspaper announcement, two pencil drawings by Joe McKay, two court transcripts, and decree-changing name

I'm honored to have been invited to perform at The New Museum Saturday 12/11/10 for the phenomenal Artist Kristin Lucas. Her Refresh Project has to do with multiplication of identities in the internet age. She chose me to read because of the specific history of my name.

Refresh Cold Reads with César Alvarez
December 11^th, 2010 – 5:00 PM – New Museum 2nd floor

New technology doesn’t just offer new conveniences; it also equips us with new metaphors. In 2007, Kristin Lucas told a judge she wanted to legally change her name from Kristin Sue Lucas to Kristin Sue Lucas, in order to refresh herself as though she were a web page.

Museum visitors are invited to perform live impromptu cold reads of the Refresh transcripts with guest readers who have been cast by Kristin Lucas. The Refresh transcripts document an exchange that took place between Lucas and a Judge in name change court in 2007. Lucas will be present to introduce the guest readers who were chosen based on their own life experience. César Alvarez will read for the part of Kristin because of his personal name story.

César James Alvarez is named after César Cauce and Dr. James Waller, two victims of the Greensboro Massacre. On November 3 1979, members of the KKK caravaned through an Anti-Klan protest at a public housing project in Greensboro, NC. After verbal altercations the Klansmen pulled guns from the trunks of their cars and opened fire on the demonstrators, killing 5 and injuring 11 others. Alvarez grew up with 2 other Césars who were named for Cauce. He has lived, together with the others, in remembrance of those who died. His name has always signified the loss of a close family friend along with the hope for rebirth, healing, and courage to stand up for justice. There are many others who share the names of the 5 victims of the Greensboro Massacre. The multiplication of these names represents a ripple of loss sent through a community and the desire to keep their memory and values alive.

Why is there Something instead of Nothing?

So I was visiting my friend George Raggett at his delightful and commericial/non-commercial hybrid art/charity/kiosk/installation called The Museum of Commerce. It was spectacular to just be so confused by the purpose of a place of business. I was lucky enough to see someone else come by and be confused too. In a gallery, I get to experience art but I feel the constant (and threatening) hum of business underneath the surface of every piece. George has flipped that on its head. He's plopped himself in and among chic DUMBO boutiques, while maintaining a commitment not to sell hardly anything but a $2 catalog with no writing in it (half the proceeds go to Haiti) and he gives you a free poster just for walking in the door. This is a brilliant new business model: Don't sell anything or try to make money, just act like a business. And odds are it's going to work out great in the art world. I think there are a lot of scenarios in our current economics where the more money you make the less you have. George elegantly enacts that paradox for us. While sitting on a chair that he will admit he stole from his kitchen table at home. Music is free now, and so is art apparently.

Perhaps you should meet some of my new favorite artists.

Senryu - Myspace - Website


Secret Mommy - Myspace - Website



Alison O'Daniel - Website


Ben Kamen - Myspace - Website

This is a watercolor that sammy gave me for my birthday.