Update: 2014-2015 Links and Highlights

Please note, due to an artistic and exploratory transition I'm undergoing currently with the Idylls, Poets Theater, and Poetics Theatre, I rarely update this blog - as you've surely noticed (last update last summer)! For more frequent updates related to all of my writing, please check out www.magusmagnus.com

& yet, as evidenced by the activity listed below, the march for Poets Theater and Poetics Theatre goes on. Plus, as a crucial component of said transition, I've been working on a new set of Idylls, evolving the form and techniques in mind of what theater and acting can uniquely do, and how perennially vital "the poetic" is to live performance. Idylls stalwart Harlie Sponaugle has been with me all the way, working at the level of the actor's spoken line to construct a first new Idyll, tentatively titled "Can't Let the Crazies Derail Us."

Harlie Sponaugle

Here's what's been happening since last summer, 2014:

An excerpt from my conceptual theater/performance piece
drone: poetic monologue for monotone
(“Cognitive Machine Learning”
& CRS Poems for the People 1 &2)
appeared in Nerve Lantern: Axon of Performance Literature Issue 9

In my last entry dated 2 August 2014, I posted pics from the Nerve Lantern show at Medicine Show Theater in New York, where I performed the same selection. Now you can see the Video of that performance.

In that same post, I gave details on the then upcoming Boog Poets Theater night it was my pleasure to host and curate for the Welcome to Boog City Festival of Poetry, Music, and Theater 2014. Here are the vids from  that event as well:

Part of my ongoing artistic exploration is to continue to try to define the qualities and practice of Poets Theater and Poetics Theatre, the latter understood as a subset of the former - purist definitions don't interest me, but the distinctions can make a difference when it comes to inspiration and creative urgency. Poetics Theatre consciously applies contemporary so-called "innovative" poetics concerns and issues to the interactivity of performance and language, with an affinity for the materiality of words and for the abstraction of "voice" and character. drone, as conceptual theater (as well as being a continuation by other means of the art of the monologue), might fall into this category more than the Idylls do so far, just as conceptual writing takes its place amidst "innovative" poetries for its next degree of abstraction from text.

As an outdoor voice "installation," my collaborative piece, CANAL PARK AMOEBAEAN SINGING, probably falls into the realm of poetics theatre as well; but again, the definitions don't seem to matter as much. Each of my collaborators fall into a different tradition of contemporary poetry. (& I consciously use the word "tradition" even when discussing innovative forms - since styles quickly congeal).

 Performance/Performance curator:  This Place Has a Voice
CANAL PARK AMOEBAEAN SINGING: Are Pastorals Idle in an Age of Corporate-Civic Structured Spaces?
(Magus Magnus voice composition for outdoor speakers)
eckClog 1: Nothing Missing Here But Song                 written and performed with Tony Mancus
eckClog 2: Corydon on the Street Corner                     written and performed with Casey Smith
eckClog 3: Rubber Snake in the Grass                         written and performed with Gowri Koneswaran
Plus, Performative Eater Jon Lee (curated by Magus Magnus)
Canal Park      Canal Park Event Day
Washington, D.C.        September 20, 2014

This piece will be published as chapbook from Furniture Press later this summer, now to be titled  eckClogs.

Meanwhile, I still have the impulse to make the distinction when I describe another poetics theatre piece of mine emerging from immersion in very mainstream poetry and theater conceptions (this experience wasn't even poets theater, but theater theater of old school verse plays):
"Farce Rorschach Illumination"
came out of my being Valentine’s Day Poet in Residence, for "Poets Are Present"
during Shakespeare Theatre Company’s The Metromaniacs
a French farce in verse adapted and translated by David Ives
Lansburgh Theatre
Washington, DC         February 14, 2015

“Farce Rorschach Illumination” appears in the Poets Are Present Anthology
published nicely by Shakespeare Theatre Company; and again, the distinctions fall apart; the piece is experimental poetry in form, yet I consider it - like drone - on a continuum with my Idylls work.

Admittedly, a particular occasion induced me to develop some of these distinctions:

 “8 Phases of Staring at the Sun," performance and presentation
for AWP panel Poetics Theater:a Textual and Theatrical Performance and Discussion
moderated by Kaveh Bassiri, with fellow panelists Rodrigo Toscano, Joyelle McSweeney, and Patrick Durgin
AWP 15 at Minneapolis Convention Center
Minneapolis, Minnesota            April 10, 2015

Plus, please check out
“Type Bleeds Tentacles” a mesostic poem with recording 
at Really System’s Really System Labs
which emerged under the direct influence of
 “Polyphonic readings and harmonic listening of Cage texts”
my 3 hr performance installation in Litmore Library
with Christophe Casamassima and Chris Mason
for States & Drives II: Responses to John Cage
Litmore
Baltimore, Maryland             March 28, 2015

That polyvocalic performance brings us full circle back to eckClogs, for one event to announce here at least (after so many listed after the fact), CANAL PARK AMOEBAEAN SINGING redux for an upcoming Litmore fundraiser, June 13th:

Boog this weekend, Nerve Lantern show 7/19, and Rain Taxi interview up now

This Weekend!: Boog Poets Theater Night
@ Welcome to Boog City Festival of Poetry, Music, and Theater 2014
Sunday, August 3rd                  doors open 5:30pm
Sidewalk Cafe, 94 Avenue A       New York, New York


Boog 2014 program

I've had the pleasure to curate - and will have the pleasure to present tomorrow night - the following works...

Geoffrey Gatza, Duchamp Draws Rrose Selavy

Laynie Browne, Tardigrade Play

Joel Allegretti, Confession?

Carlo Parcelli, The Gospel According to Simon Kananaios: a Meditation on Empire

C. J. Ehrlich, Ask Zsuzsanna: Single Motherhood at 50

7:15p.m. Janis Butler Holm, S_ _ T

7:20 p.m. Ellen Redbird, Seventh Half: an excerpt from Unrequited Symbiosis: a Mitochondrial Mistranslation & Underwater Opera

7:35 p.m. Joyelle McSweeney, excerpts from Dead Youth, or The Leaks

Photos from Nerve Lantern show

here I am, reading drone

& here's an interview on Rain Taxi with poet Jay Besemer
much talk of Idylls and the imaginary in performance
Where the Blur Occurs

Author Website Launch, and Ongoing Idylls

A Shared Imagining has been my chosen venue for announcing events and performances, and for discussing theater, poets theater and poetics theatre (specifically the technique of the Idyll), since the publication of Idylls for a Bare Stage - going on 3 years + now.

Meanwhile, my theatrical work is in context with a broader literary endeavor, and so at last I've launched an online go-to point for me as an author: www.magusmagnus.com

Broader endeavor notwithstanding, this launch coincides with the start of a summer lined up to be predominantly focused on poets theater and performance:

I'll be performing “drone: poetic monologue for monotone" for a Nerve Lantern showcase on Saturday, July 19th at 3pm

That's at Medicine Show Theater
549 West 52nd Street, 3rd Floor
New York, New York

This year I'm curator (and host) of Boog Poets Theater Night
for the 8th Annual Welcome to Boog City Festival of Poetry, Music, and Theater
That's Sunday, August 3rd; doors open 5:30pm
Sidewalk Cafe
94 Avenue A
New York, New York

Then after Labor Day, I'll be curator of performances (and composer of a doc text collage, or chorale, along similar lines as drone, but for four voices)
for This Place Has a Voice
Canal Park Arts Project (director: Bruce McCaig) Event
That's Saturday, September 20th, twilight at Canal Park
202 M Street, SE
Washington, D.C.

Beyond my own work as poet and curator this summer, as a parent I'll be immersed in my son Gryphon's entry into professional theater, featured at age 8 as the only child in DEVIATED THEATRE's "creature," an original dance opera by Kimmie Dobbs Chan and Enoch Chan.

 "creature"
premieres at the Ailey Citigroup Theater on August 8th, 7:30 pm
405 West 55th Street 
New York, NY
&
comes to Dance Place September 27-28
 3225 8th Street NE
Washington D.C.

Yet, with all the indicated external activity, the creative process progresses internally, and somewhat invisibly. I'm in a transitional period with regard to producing showcases and presentations of work connected to the Idylls, and am beginning to develop a batch of new Idylls reflective of what I've learned over these years through rehearsal and performance. This blog has been an outlet for some of the real-time thinking and response to first applications of the theory of the Idyll for acting and theater; and now I'm ready to put such thought and experiences into a next evolution of the form.

I'll continue to update here, mostly for event announcements pertaining to my Idylls and performance work, as well as with any irrepressible musings.

 

Theory and Technique of the Idyll

Over the past couple of months, on the way towards March 20th's Idylls showcase for Happenings at the Harman, the technique of the Idyll for performance has sharpened in definitiveness.  This development has occurred during conceptual meetings, as well as in rehearsal - part of our practice and process - and not least in relation to a workshop I gave in January at Bloombars (which had the additional bonus of bringing new excellent performers in on the project).

The techniques continue to evolve simply due to gained experience over time, from continuous honing of the theory and vision as expressed here in this blog ("A Shared Imagining" as an interpretation of the nature of the poetry performance form of the Idyll), and through steady application of ideas found in the introduction of my book Idylls for a Bare Stage - that introduction now appearing as an essay titled "Imagination and Performance" in the performance journal Nerve Lantern #6   (officially available on March 18th).  

More and more, we have begun to rehearse consciously on multiple levels of imagination.  I'll give more details and specifics on how we've stylized the performances in relation to imagination - how we actually conduct blocking in the realm of the imaginary - when I post specifically on the Harman show.

Meanwhile next week, on Friday March 8th, for Towson University's 5th annual Geo-aesthetics Conference, we're presenting a program titled A Shared Imagining: Beyond Self-Enclosure in Performance through the theory and technique of the Idyll, featuring performances by Stephen Mead and Natalie Briggs Cutcher.

I hope to post a profile of Natalie in time for the conference.  She'll be performing Anne Ashbaugh's Leda.

And Stephen is with us once again, doing the Street Merchant from my Idyll of the Arabian Nights.
 


Stephen's complete bio can be found where he's profiled elsewhere on the site, and his more recent appearances in the Washington DC area include All's Well that Ends Well for the Maryland Shakespeare Festival, Romeo and Juliet for Vpstart Crow Theatre Company, and Medieval StoryLand, a hit at the 2012 Capital Fringe Festival;  he is also as an entertainer at local hotels, and has performed programs of his Dickens recitations including his one man show version of A Christmas Carol to acclaim at venues in DC and Virginia.  With the Idylls and SiGiLPAL, he's on his way to Happenings at the Harman, while Murder on the Bare Stage (see October entry) will go to CapFringe in summer 2013.

 

Stephen Mead as the Street Merchant

Here's some further context about the upcoming Geo-aesthetics Conference presentation (providing a number of indications relevant to the techniques in question)...

When the conference's Call for Abstracts came to my attention, I couldn't help but notice how much the wording of the call, and its concepts, corresponded to our structural sense of what we were doing through performance of the Idylls, including what's explored on this blog, under its title.  

So, I'm posting the call here, as well as a version of my abstract answering that call, for another angle on the uses and intent behind the Idyll form conceived of as "A Shared Imagining."

Call for Abstracts

Fifth Annual Geo-aesthetics Conference

March 8-9, 2013

Geo-aesthetics and World Peace

The International Association for the Study of Environment, Space, and Place will sponsor the Fifth Geo-aesthetics Conference at Towson University. The conference is co-sponsored by the Department of Philosophy and the Department of Art at Towson University. 

In the light of the rise of modern subjectivism, one should not be surprised to find out that aesthetic experience has increasingly fallen under the reign of subjectivism. The construction of the individual as a self-enclosed entity has led to the restriction of aesthetic experience to such an enclosure. Accordingly, for many of us, aesthetic experience is a matter of inwardness. It is a matter for what is private. This location has become a refuge where one finds solace or inner peace. This circumscription of aesthetic experience has severed a deeper relation the individual has with others. The encounter with other individuals is often an encounter with other isolated beings. Consequently, aesthetic experience appears foreign to the experience of the common bond that human beings ought to have with one another. The more individuals exclusively cultivate inner peace, the more they become estranged from experiencing the common bond they have with other human beings and, hence, from a truly authentic peace. Since, for us, “to be” is to be “in-the-world”, genuine peace can only be cultivated in an aesthetic experience that is rooted in-the-world and that embraces the bond that all human beings have with one another. The conference seeks to bring together those who are interested in sharing their views on this matter. Since the world is essentially sensuous, participants will share with each other their sense of sensuous rootedness in-the-world and also on how this rootedness bears on world peace. Presentations that seek to affirm or reclaim the sensuous as the site for the generation, preservation, and promotion of the world peace are welcome. 
...

Presentations of art works, musical performances, poetry readings, and theatrical performances are encouraged.   

A Shared Imagining: Beyond Self-Enclosure in Performance

abstract for a seminar/performance presentation by Magus Magnus

To this day millions still sing along with John Lennon’s “Imagine,” even as we’re more likely to come across bumper stickers which read “Visualize Whirled Peas” rather than “Visualize World Peace.”  Thus, there is some acknowledgement that the practice of extending the inner world outwardly, en masse – through imagination and conscious visualization – has a part in healing the earth and humanity. 

...through years of engagement with the poetic performance form of the Idyll, a practice has emerged which encourages people in becoming conscious and purposeful in creation of an open bond between themselves as performers (or speakers of any kind) and their audience, as opposed to retaining the usual self-enclosure of “delivery” – the practice comes out of interpreting the Idyll, from its roots in Theocritus, as a “shared imagining.”  Participation in the theory and techniques of the Idyll helps hone approaches to performance and text in which boundaries between artist and audience are dissolved in strengthened awareness of a common bond.  Also, the seminar will include – or could consist solely of – performances demonstrating such an approach, bringing the audience into full consciousness of a communal mental space, often experienced as an “evolutionary” sense of multiplicity in the relational possibilities of self with others. Much of the content of this presentation is an entry into ideas formulated in the introduction of Magus Magnus’ book Idylls for a Bare Stage (twentythreebooks, 2011, Towson); forthcoming at about the time of the conference, the book introduction will be republished as an essay titled “Imagination and Performance” in the journal Nerve Lantern: Axon of Performance Literature.

Indeed, the seminar will consist almost solely of Natalie's and Stephen's performance, with brief outlining of the shared imaging concept, towards bringing our audience to a consciousness of their engagement in this shared imagining - something only possible in live theater and, at this level of conscious practice, something unique to the poetic performance form of the Idyll.

 

and now towards 2013

Parading with the Idylls into the New Year!

Much in the works, and I'm finding myself orienting to the coming year in a number of ways with regard to the Idylls, and with regard to its (currently informal) framework for performance approaches to the form, and beyond: SiGiLPAL (Sui Generis Literary Performing Arts Lab).

Right around the corner, as mentioned in previous posts: Happenings at the Harman will host an Idylls showcase on March 20th.

As also mentioned in this space, "Murder on the Bare Stage" debuted at Bloombars the weekend before Halloween.  It is definitely a show - upon the experience of that night, we've applied to take it to Fringe this summer.  The intermixing of the Idyll form and Stephen Mead's specialty in dramatic recitation brought out the contours and distinctive effects of each approach, for an intense impact on the audience.  This, in service of the chilling nature of the theme.

Thus began our collaboration with Bloombars, a wonderful community arts space in Columbia Heights led by John Chambers, with poetry-related programming managed by Gowri Koneswaran, both incredible people to work with.   Upcoming soon there: I'm holding a workshop on the performance technique of the Idyll, titled Power of the Poetic Monologue, on January 13th, 2:30pm. This is an introductory version of the 3-part workshops I did at the D.C. Actors' Center in 2011, developing the acting and theatrical approach to the form.  The workshop also functions as an audition for performers interested in the possibility of paid performance opportunities through the Idylls/SiGiLPAL projects. More information about the workshops/audition at the following links...

Bloombars Calendar 

 Facebook event

Furthermore, I'm excited by the upcoming appearance of my introduction to Idylls for a Bare Stage in the journal Nerve Lantern, edited by the painstaking, thorough, and wonderfully sensitive-to-detail Ellen Redbird.

Nerve Lantern: Axon of Performance Literature

For the purposes of this publication, the introduction is titled "Imagination and Performance."

Idylls for a Bare Stage exists as a book (you can order it here), and also as a complete theatrical piece to be performed in order, all twelve idylls; at the same time individual idylls have been and can be performed on their own, part of what I've been doing on my own initiative, and as reflected in this blog.  Also, the book can function for actors as a high end source for audition monologues. 

Yet, beyond the work as a book and piece(s) for theater, there is the idea of the idyll, and its concomitant theory and techniques for acting and theater - the idea of the Idyll as a form, the re-interpretation of an ancient form for contemporary purposes.

This is what the introduction to the book (and its upcoming incarnation as an essay, "Imagination and Performance") offers; and this is what I'm trying for in the workshops/audition, "Power of the Poetic Monologue" - to activate an idea of, and for, performance which addresses  the question, what does live theater still have to offer uniquely in competition with every other form of media?

Well, for one thing, the word.  The live word, the living embodied in-person delivery of charged language.  The "poetic," in the flesh. Live bodies, bare stage - rather than going for expensive spectacle, I'm going for portable essence.

In developing the Idylls approach, there has been much honing in on a contemporary standard for the stage (or sidewalk) delivery of poetic language: much to avoid in both the theater world and the poetry reading world, all the varieties of pretension from staginess to "wispiness," from the overly intoned to the monotone...  an essential aspect of the idylls technique is a trust in the intrinsic power of words.  Each word speaks itself, if you let it.

From there - and this goes deeper into the nature of the form, delving into the etymologies of the ancient Greek word idyll and its cousins, as I do in the essay/book introduction - an exploration of the living invisible, basically: the relationship of imagination to performance.

We are actually working with the invisible, or the heretofore or nearly invisible: invisible, because imagined - conscious workings of the imagination, live.  This is something that cannot be done when involved with the intermediary of screens.

The Idyll form consciously works on at least three levels of reality (and part of the art is to make this conscious both to artist and audience):  the actor on the stage, the body/performer on the stage (visible); the imagined stage setting as created by the actor in character (actually invisible, but the audience sees it!); and then also, the character's internal life conveyed to the audience through the shared imagining - this is almost all invisible, but creates an unmistakable impact on the performance, one can tell when an actor is truly "seeing" whatever memory or projection she or he is putting to words.

The actor must actually imagine what he or she is thinking about, and the audience can perceive that - it is all apparently invisible, though likely we find clues and our brains put it all together from facial expressions, position of the bodies, even style of breathing...  the art - its artistic intention, its relevance and magic - is in revealing these levels of reality, making them manifest and conscious. 

I could also say, entry into this "shared imagining" is evolutionary for humans, a circumscribed engagement in group telepathy; at the very least, it opens up a temporary space for communion.

Anyway, the Idyll in performance is equivalent to some other modes of art demonstrating - or,
demon-starting (as I have it elsewhere, following my daimon) - phenomena.

The Idylls in performance and their uses/denial/phenomenology of invisibility might have resonance with one of my poems from Verb Sap, a poem also included in the 10th edition of Pearson Longman's textbook anthology of English, Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing...

Empirical / Imperial Demonstration

             The difference between

                    what is seen                                                  and what is not seen

                           what is heard                                                           and unheard

                                      what is touched                                                and intangible 

             isn't the difference between

                            what is there                                                and