Target Free Thursday Nights in November Feature Talk on Digital Poetry, Open Dance Rehearsal, and Film Screening
An open rehearsal for a world premiere dance performance linking American and Congolese contemporary dance creators; a program of digital poetry; and a screening of one of China’s first independent films highlight November Target Free Thursday Nights at the Walker Art Center. In addition, Sound Bites gallery talks spotlighting works on view in the exhibitions Dan Graham: Beyond, Haegue Yang: Integrity of the Insider, and Dirt on Delight: Impulses That Form Clay are also featured. These free evenings, when galleries are open from 5–9 pm, take place Thursdays, November 5, 12, and 19 (closed November 26).
The first Thursday of November features an open rehearsal for Reggie Wilson/Andréya Quamba’s Walker-commissioned work The Good Dance: Dakar: Brooklyn (November 5, 7 pm). Developed across two continents for the past three years, this collaborative project between American dance/theater-maker Wilson and his Brooklyn-based Fist & Hell Performance Group and Congolese contemporary dance creator Quamba and his award-winning Senegal-based Compagnie 1er Temps Dance will be staged in the McGuire Theater November 12–14. Presented on subsequent Thursday evenings will be a Free Verse talk on digital poetry, a new approach to an ancient art form, with Oni Buchanan and Brian Kim Stefans (November 12, 7 pm); and a screening of Zhang Yuan’s Beijing Bastards (Beijing za zhong), part of the Walker series The People’s Republic of Cinema: 60 Years of China on Film (November 19, 7:30 pm).
Sound Bites gallery talks are offered throughout the month on select Thursday evenings at 6:30 and 7 pm. Sound Bites illuminate an artist or work of art from the Walker’s world-class collection or one of its special exhibitions.
Target Free Thursday Nights
November 5, 12, 19 (closed November 26 for Thanksgiving)
Galleries open 5–9; special events follow.
Free
Thursday, November 5
Sound Bites: Dan Graham’s Homes for America, 6:30 and 7 pm
Meet in the Bazinet Garden Lobby
Join a Walker tour guide for a brief insider’s view on Dan Graham’s Homes for America, his series of photographs of suburban homes and tract housing.
Open Rehearsal: Reggie Wilson and Andréya Ouamba, 7 pm
McGuire Theater
Free tickets available at the Hennepin Lobby desk from 6 pm
Brooklyn-based dancer and choreographer Reggie Wilson and his Congolese/Sengalese colleague, Andréya Ouamba, present a sneak preview of The Good Dance: Dakar/Brooklyn even as they put the finishing touches on this work they’ve been developing across two continents for the past three years.
Thursday, November 12
Sound Bites: Haegue Yang’s Yearning Melancholy Red, 6:30 and 7 pm
Meet in the Bazinet Garden Lobby
Get connected to new and exciting ideas. Join a Walker tour guide for a brief insider’s view of Haegue Yang’s meticulously choreographed sensory environment.
Free Verse: Digital Poetry with Oni Buchanan and Brian Kim Stefans, 7 pm
Cinema
Free tickets available at the Bazinet Garden Lobby desk from 6 pm
Like everything else in our world, poetry has gone digital, yielding fresh approaches and new insights (and even some controversy) to an ancient art form. Using digital media, Buchanan and Stefans present their latest hypermedia works on screen and in person, and afterwards take questions about the past, present, and future of digital poetry. Buchanan is the author of two poetry volumes, What Animal and Spring, and a conservatory-trained concert pianist who performs frequently around the country. Stefans founded arras.net, a Web site devoted to new media poetry and poetics, in 1998. He teaches at UCLA and has written numerous books of poetry and essays.
Free Verse is copresented by Rain Taxi Review of Books.
Thursday, November 19
Sound Bites: Ann Agee’s work in Dirt on Delight: Impulses That Form Clay, 6:30 and 7 pm
Meet in the Bazinet Garden Lobby
Contemporary art and artists are the focus of these 15-minute gallery conversations led by Walker tour guides. Each highlights selected artworks, artists, or themes that serve as topics for illuminating discussions.
Film: Beijing Bastards (Beijing za zhong), 7:30 pm
Directed by Zhang Yuan
Cinema
Free tickets available at the Bazinet Garden Lobby desk from 6 pm
While searching for his pregnant girlfriend, rock singer Cui Jian drinks, smokes, does drugs, and carouses aimlessly. A bleak treatise on youth, cast with actual rock musicians and artists, Beijing Bastards is considered one of the first “independent” films in China, and was partly financed by Zhang’s income from directing music videos. Called “the Sixth Generation’s first major film” (Time), it sparked controversy in China, but won special jury awards at the Locarno and Singapore film festivals. 1993, 35mm, 95 minutes.
This screening is presented as part of the series The People’s Republic of Cinema: 60 Years of China on Film.
Thursday, November 26
Thanksgiving – Walker closed