PAGE 6 • GO! MAGAZINE
THURSDAY, APRIL 15, 2021 • THE BULLETIN
talent
The Bulletin and Scalehouse, a collaborative for
the arts, have joined to raise donations to help
Central Oregon’s creative artists — musicians, visual artists,
performers and creative workers — by offering grants and
a platform to bring attention to local amazing talent. This is
a crowdfunding effort with a first-round fundraising goal of
$40,000. To make a tax-deductible donation or apply for a
grant, go to bendbulletin.com/talent.
Kaupp misses
the audiences
BY DAVID JASPER
The Bulletin
W
hen the pandemic abruptly
halted the risqué business of
Bend Burlesque, Mehama
Kaupp and other members of the Cen-
tral Oregon dance troupe struggled
to keep creatively active. Kaupp is this
week’s featured artist in the Central Or-
egon Creative Artists Relief Effort, or
CO CAREs, a grant program aiming
to offset financial setbacks of area per-
formers and artists.
“We were all kind of unmotivated,
due to quarantine depression, I think,”
Kaupp said. “I have Darling Divine
running the Patreon (a membership
app that allows patrons can directly
support artists), but nobody was really
— we couldn’t get together, we couldn’t
meet up. It was just kind of, like, com-
plete shutdown.”
In the early days of COVID-19,
Kaupp, a nurse by profession, was an
early innovator. She created a video
performance series, the Shelter in Place
Showcase, a COVID-safe creative out-
let in which dancers, comedians and
other entertainers were filmed per-
forming on porches and backyards for
home viewing.
“We were trying to do whatever we
could and try and stay motivated for a
few months,” she said.
But something felt like it was miss-
ing: an audience.
“I feel like live entertainment needs
an audience, like a live audience,
when you’re doing stuff that felt really
crowd-interactive,” she said. “We like to
involve the audience and talk to the audi-
ence and have people come up on stage,
so it just kind of put the kibosh on that.”
While Bend Burlesque Co. is a small
operation, Kaupp said it took a financial
hit during the pandemic. The company
had to move out of the office space it had
only recently moved into and could no
longer afford a practice space.
“The business doesn’t make tons of
money anyway,” she said. “It’s a small
business. We do shows once or twice a
month, so it’s not like we were raking in
cash before, but it just took the hugest
hit. We just have nothing to fall back
on. It just became (me) supporting the
business on my own, which is not what
I want to do. That’s not the goal of run-
ning a small business, to stress out con-
stantly financially.”
On April 2 and 3, Bend Burlesque Co.
was able to return to the stage, putting on
a springtime-flavored show “Birds, Bees,
and Bare Knees” for small audiences at
The Capitol, located in downtown Bend.
“We have to follow the strict guide-
lines there, which we’re happy to do,”
Kaupp said. “Everyone just wants to
perform. … Performing for 40 people,
it takes a little longer to warm every-
body up, but it’s way more intimate,
way more worth it. It was fun.”
David Jasper: 541-383-0349,
djasper@bendbulletin.com
David Helton/Submitted photo
Mehama Kaupp entertains the audience in one of Bend Burlesque Co.’s “Birds, Bees, and
Bare Knees” shows April 2 and 3 at The Capitol in downtown Bend.