Exhibition · Performance Space New York
Shawné Michaelain Holloway
._SUITABLE_FOR.EXE[CUTION]
Oct 23 – Dec 19
About the show
Please note: to enjoy the full one hour experience of the installation, we ask our audience to arrive on the hour.
Power is everywhere, in our relationships, our bodies, our beds, behind screens, and between the artist and her audience. In her 20-part multimedia opus, THE Chamber Series (2017-2021), Shawné Michaelain Holloway uses the languages of BDSM, animal training, algorithms, and robotics to explore how power, desire, and violence are inextricably interconnected from our most intimate to our most public relationships.
._SUITABLE_FOR.EXE—part expanded cinema installation, part evening-length performance—marks the end of the series and is organized around scores. Ranging from direct commands to subtle interventions the performers and audience members have to negotiate how to respond to the power at play. To the artist, BDSM’s explicit rules around submission and domination offer the opportunity to recognize more clearly how in our lives “pleasure, love, desire, violence, and anything that could be dark or dangerous are in conversation with each other at all times.”
About Performance Space New York
As the New York performing arts world has become increasingly institutionalized, and the shortcomings within our industry were further revealed during the ravages and transformations of 2020, our focus has been not just on presenting boundary-breaking work but on restructuring our own organization towards prioritizing equity and access.
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