PARTICIPANTS KYLE ABRAHAM - ELIZABETH ALEXANDER - ERIC BERRYMAN TANIA BRUGUERA - MAJORA CARTER - JAMES BURLING CHASE EISA DAVIS - ELIZABETH DILLER - KIMBERLY DREW - JOHN EDMONDS ADAM J. FOSS - MALIK GAINES - THEASTER GATES TONY GERBER - REGGIE (REGG ROC) GRAY - DICK GRIFFIN FRANCESCA HARPER - CRAIG HARRIS - NONA HENDRYX BRANDEN JACOBS-JENKINS - ARTHUR JAFA - SHANI JAMILA - JAWWAAD NAVID KHONSARI - VASSILIKI KHONSARI - JASON KING - GREGG LAMBERT DAVID LANG - ERNIE LARSEN - LIZ LECOMPTE - SARAH LEWIS SEAMUS MCGRAW - AJA MONET - JASON MORAN - FRED MOTEN SHIRIN NESHAT - LYNN NOTTAGE - KENDALL R. PHILLIPS JEREMY RICHMAN - CARL HANCOCK RUX - ALEXANDRO SEGADE TANYA SELVARATNAM - MARVIN SEWELL - ANNA DEAVERE SMITH HANK WILLIS THOMAS - CARMELITA TROPICANA - BASIL TWIST ROBERTA UNO - IMANI UZURI - KATE VALK - CARRIE MAE WEEMS Thompson Arts Center at Park Avenue Armory | 643 Park Avenue at 67th Street CONVERSATION SERIES: INTERROGATIONS OF FORM CARRIE MAE WEEMS THE SHAPE OF THINGS Sunday, December 17, 2017 from 12:00pm to 10:00pm Thompson Arts Center at Park Avenue Armory As Armory artist-in-residence Carrie Mae Weems concludes her year-long residency, she continues to grapple with the history of violence in our country—personally and within her body of work. Weems curates this day-long convening of artists, writers, poets, musicians, thinkers and social theorists, inviting them to join her in a critique of our tumultuous political and social climate. Audiences are invited to join participants in interrogating this complex topic through a series of readings, performances, conversations, and other artistic responses held throughout the day in the Armory’s first and second floor historic rooms. SEASON SPONSORS Park Avenue Armory’s Artist-in-Residence program is made possible by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Additional support for The Shape of Things has been provided by Jack Shainman Gallery; the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation; and Gregg Lambert (co-founder), Perpetual Peace Project, CNY Humanities Corridor. Support for Park Avenue Armory’s artistic season has been generously provided by the Charina Endowment Fund, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Altman Foundation, The Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust, the Achelis and Bodman Foundation, the Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation, the Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation, The Shubert Foundation, The Emma and Georgina Bloomberg Foundation, the Marc Haas Foundation, The Kaplen Brothers Fund, the Juliet Lea Hillman Simonds Foundation, the Leon Levy Foundation, the May and Samuel Rudin Family Foundation, and the Isak and Rose Weinman Foundation. Cover photo: Carrie Mae Weems armoryonpark.org | @ParkAveArmory | #TheShapeofThings #PAAInterrogations SCHEDULE FIRST FLOOR GRAND STAIRCASE BOARD OF OFFICERS ROOM: MUSIC & PRESENTATIONS Readings & Performances to mark the hour 12:00pm: Flatbush Avenue Film 1:00pm: Francesca Harper 12:30pm: Marvin Sewell Group 2:00pm: Dick Griffin 1:00pm: Readings 3:00pm: Eisa Davis 1:30pm: Dick Griffin & Carl Hancock Rux 4:00pm: Aja Monet 2:00pm: Welcome by Carrie Mae Weems 5:00pm: JAWWAAD 2:15pm: Ink Stories: Navid & Vassiliki Khonsari 6:00pm: Elizabeth Alexander 2:30pm: Shirin Neshat 7:00pm: Carl Hancock Rux 3:00pm: Kendall R. Phillips 3:30pm: Roberta Uno 4:00pm: Majora Carter & James Burling Chase SECOND FLOOR: OPEN STUDIOS 4:30pm: Liz Diller 5:00pm: Fred Moten COMPANY A: MALIK GAINES 5:30pm: David Lang 12:00-10:00pm: Readings and performances organized by artists Malik 6:30pm: Theaster Gates Gaines and Alexandro Segade 7:00pm: Carrie Mae Weems, with Craig Harris & Kyle Abraham 7:45pm: Elizabeth Alexander COMPANY B: LYNN NOTTAGE 8:00pm: Anna Deavere Smith 12:00-10:00pm: Screening of THIS IS READING films, by Lynn 8:30pm: Craig Harris & band Nottage & Tony Gerber 9:00pm: Nona Hendryx 1:45pm: Q&A with filmmaker Tony Gerber 9:30pm: Jason Moran 9:55pm: Closing Remarks COMPANY C: CARRIE MAE WEEMS 12:00-10:00pm: Screening of projects by Carrie Mae Weems VETERANS ROOM: MUSIC & CONTEMPLATIONS 2:00pm: Performance by Two from Breakneck Ridge (David A. Ross and 12:30pm: Two from Breakneck Ridge Patrick Stanfield Jones) 1:00pm: JAWWAAD 1:20pm: Hank Willis Thomas COMPANY F: REGGIE (REGG ROC) GRAY 1:30pm: Aja Monet 12:00-10:00pm: Open rehearsal and demos with Reggie (Regg Roc) Gray 1:45pm: Arthur Jafa and the D.R.E.A.M. Ring 2:00pm: Adam J. Foss 2:30pm: Reggie (Regg Roc) Gray COMPANY I: TANIA BRUGUERA 2:45pm: Seamus McGraw 12:00-10:00pm: An afternoon of art and activism with DACA students 3:30pm: Kimberly Drew & performance artist Tania Bruguera 4:00pm: Tania Bruguera 4:30pm: Gregg Lambert COMPANY K: BRANDEN JACOBS-JENKINS & CARMELITA TROPICANA 5:00pm: John Edmonds 12:30-6:30pm: Marathon reading of Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass 5:15pm: Malik Gaines 5:30pm: Ernie Larsen COMPANY L: MARVIN SEWELL 6:00pm: Sarah Lewis 3:30-4:30pm: Performance with Marvis Sewell Group 6:30pm: Jeremy Richman 7:00pm: Imani Uzuri COMPANY M: BASIL TWIST 7:30pm: The Wooster Group: Eric Berryman, Elizabeth LeCompte, & Kate Valk 12:00-10:00pm: Visiting hours with puppet Lee Nagrin 8:00pm: Jason King 2:00pm, 4:00pm, and 6:00pm: Excerpts from Behind the Lid, created and performed by Basil Twist SCREENING ROOM Projection design by Daniel Brodie Films and content by Doug DuBois with Jim Goldberg, John Edmonds, Ink Stories, Mary Mattingly, Arthur Jafa, Shirin Neshat, Lynn Nottage & Tony Gerber, Fazal Sheikh, Hank Willis Thomas, and Carrie Mae Weems Note: Participants and times subject to change Colonels Room: Listening & Conversations 1:15pm: Shirin Neshat & Jason King, moderated by Kendall Phillips 3:15pm: Liz Diller & David Lang, moderated by Sarah Lewis 5:15pm: Majora Carter & Theaster Gates, moderated by Avery Willis Hoffman 6:15pm: Nona Hendryx & Aja Monet, moderated by Kimberly Drew Thompson Arts Center at Park Avenue Armory | 643 Park Avenue at 67th Street Company Company Company Company K L M A SECOND FLOOR Company Company Company Company I F C B PARK AVENUE Lounge Colonels Room Screening Room FIRST FLOOR Veterans Room Entrance PARK AVENUE armoryonpark.org | @ParkAveArmory | #TheShapeofThings #PAAInterrogations ABOUT THE PARTICIPANTS KYLE ABRAHAM JAMES BURLING CHASE In 2011, OUT Magazine labeled Kyle Abraham as the “best and bright- James met Majora Carter after sailing a 43-foot boat from Curacao to est creative talent to emerge in New York City in the age of Obama.” Fiji, and returned to NYC in search of real adventure. They were soon Abraham is the proud recipient of a 2016 Doris Duke Award, a 2012 married, and together they have combined his TV advertising experi- United States Fellowship, and several coveted Princess Grace Awards. ence with her crushing authenticity to create projects and messaging In 2013, he was named a MacArthur Fellow. Over the past several years, that is sometimes challenging for those in the Social Justice Industrial Abraham has created works for Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, Wendy Complex, but that regular people can relate to and enjoy. Whelan’s Restless Creature, and recently premiered his second work for Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater entitled Untitled America. ELIZABETH DILLER Elizabeth Diller is a founding partner of interdisciplinary design studio, ELIZABETH ALEXANDER Diller Scofidio + Renfro (DS+R). The studio’s projects include: the Elizabeth Alexander has shaped and directed Ford Foundation’s grant High Line; the transformation of Lincoln Center for the Performing making in arts, media, and culture since 2015. She is the author of six Arts campus; The Shed; and the renovation and expansion of the books of poetry, including American Sublime, a finalist for the 2005 Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). Recent projects include the London Pulitzer Prize, and The Light of the World, her critically-acclaimed mem- Centre for Music, the 34-acre Zaryadye Park adjacent to the Kremlin oir on love and loss, also a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. In 2009, she in Moscow; the Museum of Image & Sound on Copacabana Beach in wrote and delivered her poem “Praise Song for the Day” for Presi- Rio; The Broad, a contemporary art museum in Los Angeles, and the dent Obama’s first inauguration. Alexander was on the faculty of Yale Roy and Diana Vagelos Education Center at Columbia University in University for 15 years and served as chair of Yale’s African American New York. Diller is a Professor of Architecture at Princeton University. Studies Department. She was recently named the Wun Tsun Tam Mellon Professor in the Humanities at Columbia University and is a chancellor of the Academy of American Poets. KIMBERLY DREW Kimberly Drew is a writer, curator, and activist. Her writing has ap- peared in Glamour, W, Teen Vogue, and Lenny Letter. She also serves as a TANIA BRUGUERA board member for Recess Activities, Inc. and is currently the Social Me- Tania Bruguera is an installation and performance artist born in Hava- dia Manager at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. She was honored by na, Cuba. A politically-motivated performance artist, Bruguera explores AIR Gallery as the recipient of their inaugural Feminist Curator Award the relationship between art, activism, and social change in works that and was selected as one of Brooklyn Magazine’s “Brooklyn 100.” You examine the social effects of political and economic power. By creating can follow her at @museummammy on Instagram and Twitter. proposals and aesthetic models for others to use and adapt, she defines herself as an initiator rather than an author, and often collaborates with multiple institutions as well as many individuals so that the full JOHN EDMONDS realization of her artwork occurs when others adopt and perpetuate John Edmonds is an artist working in photography whose practice it. Bruguera is the first Artist-in-Residence of the New York Mayor’s includes fabric, video, and text. He received his MFA in Photography Office of Immigrant Affairs and an Artist-in-Residence at Park Avenue from Yale University School of Art and his BFA in Photography at the Armory.