26 JUSt OUt ’ October 21.2005
Continued from Page 25
.
theater, writing, holography, installation, film and video, his
work has been presented around the world, most recently at
festivals in Mexico City; Halifax, Nova Scotia; and Helsin­
ki, Finland, as well as at Artemisia Gallery in Chicago and
the Power Plant in Toronto.
His work deals with issues of personal and cultural iden­
tity and with explorations of our bodies as vessels of sensa­
tion and experience. He has a particular interest in consid­
ering rhe shared borders of our separate existences, search­
ing for a language that can convey the complex layers of
personal history, cultural/social specificity and the notion of
shared or universal experience. He is the artistic director of
Fado, a Toronto-based center for performance art, and is a
founding curator of the 7a* I Id International Performance
Art Festival.
Couillard will perform at El-fest with his partner and
Fado board member Edward Johnson, whose past work
includes writing, editing and directing as well as perform­
ance art. They have been a couple since 1991 and began
collaborating artistically in 2000. Their interpersonal rela­
tionship is based on the psychological, corporeal and intel--
lectual experience of each other as lovers, friends and part­
ners in both art and life.
Using relationships and notions of partnerships as the
basis for their playful, minimalist performances, Couillard
and Johnson explore the tensions and conflict that underlie
all partnerships. These works interrogate the political and
social concerns that surround the gay community: HIV sta­
tus, same-sex spousal benefits and popular media’s portrayal
of gay culture.
In order to maximize the informational and associative
substance of their art, they minimize the visual complexity
of their work, appearing in similar clothing such as match»
ing pajamas, black jockstraps, dark-patterned dress socks,
black shoes and safety harnesses and working with simple,
everyday, inexpensive materials. Couillard and Johnson will
perform a piece titled Duorama #40, which is emblematic of
such elements.
anguage of Silence (= death) will commemorate this
year’s Transgender Day of Remembrance, a gathering
that provides an opportunity for trans people and
allies to come together in honor of those who have fallen
victim to anti-trans violence. Audience members and guest
speakers will share stories, emotions, wisdom and comfort.
The Day of Remembrance serves several purposes.
Mainly it raises public awareness of hate crimes against
transgender people, an issue largely ignored by the main­
stream media. The vigil gives people a venue to publicly
mourn the lives of their brothers and sisters who might oth­
erwise be forgotten and to express love and respect for trans
people in the face of national indifference and hatred.
Last year’s event included a public altar and open mike
as well as performances by female-to-male hip-hop MC
Katastrophe and gender outlaw Kate Bomstein. Anyone
who is interested in planning this year’s event is welcome to
contact Outside In’s Trans/Identity Resource Centre at
503-535-3895 or tirc@outsidein.org. The free vigil will be
held from 7 to 9 p.m. Nov. 20 at Liberty Hall, 311 N. Ivy
St., which will be transformed into a wheelchair-accessible
space for the occasion.
L
Gyrlz and Rose City Copwatch will collaborate to
present Language of Swine and Freedom, an
evening of multimedia dialogue about police vio­
lence and community power. A collection of Portland
artists will present works that explore the themes of
police violence and ftxsus specifically on depictions of
community power as an alternative to the police.
This free event will be held from 7 to 11 p.m.
Nov. 16 at Backspace Annex, 115 N.W. Fifth Ave.
Half of the proceeds from the sale of art will go to
Rose City Copwatch, which works to eliminate or rad­
ically change police institutions. Its overarching goal is
to reduce police violence and disrupt the ability of the
police to enforce race and class lines. For more infor­
mation about its ongoing community projects, visit
www. rosec itycop watch .org.
his year marks the final installment of the Enter­
active Language Festival in its current format,
and an opportunity for 2 Gyrlz to expand its
knowledge and experience of performance art. In the
fall of 2006, Newman plans to begin a one-year mas­
ter’s program at Dartington College of Arts in Devon,
England. Dartington is a university-sector college with
a national and international reputation for contempo­
rary performance and creative arts practices and their
relation to changing social and cultural contexts. The
program will provide a space to develop performances
under the guidance of a mentor and a peer group,
develop a thesis apd see firsthand how performances
evolve in different cultures. The program will allow
Newman to extend her studies to other colleges
throughout Europe, without paying additional tuition.
“I chose this program because it’s just so perfectly
specific,” Newman says. “It focuses on the practice of
actually doing performance art, where other programs
often focus on theory. I also want to tap into the inter­
national performance circuit, which is very difficult to
do from the U.S.”
By spending a year in Europe, Newman and McCobb
hope to get finnly rooted in the many festivals that hap­
pen throughout the continent. They expect that their
relocation to the provincial and historic Dartington
environment will nurture creativity while allowing them
Paul Couillard and Edward Johnson explore the tensions and conflict
to focus on their work minus the distraction of their day
that underlie all partnerships Oct. 28.
jobs and the excitement of a big city.
“Dartington encouraged me to keep the collaboration
“culture.” It stands up as a challenge to the social con­
with Llewyn going while completing the MA, so I’m
structs of language, gender and identity, so that we can
planning on also continuing the work that we’ve started,
collectively move toward a place of broader understand­
along with developing some new stuff—alongside the
ing and the ultimate goal of reaching our full human
solo work that I’ll be doing,” Newman adds. While she
potential. In a society where our historical and cultural
works to earn her degree, McCobb will spend time
understanding is steeped in violence and intolerance, the
archiving all the documentation of 2 Gyrlz events from
Enteractive Language Festival serves the dual purpose of
the past five years.
cultural mirror and hammer—with plans to startle us,
Newman and McCobb agree that Portland has been an
move us and smash our misconceptions. jn
amazing and fertile place to create, and all plans at the
moment are to return, newly charged, in 2007.
The fourth ENTERACTIVE L anguage FESTIVAL will be held
What 2 Gyrlz created in Portland has become more
from Oct. 27 to Nov. 27 at various venues. For a complete
schedule visit wwiv.2gyrlz.org.
than a series of edgy art festivals and performances; it has
initiated a broader dialogue broaching topics that are
often avoided by the purveyors of mainstream American
JODI D arby is a Portland writer, activist and radio producer.
T
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