Theater & Music Go Beyond at the FERUS Festival

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Parent Category: Other Festivals

Category: Theater

Published on Thursday, 17 December 2020 20:24

Written by Brad Balfour

National Sawdust's FERUS Festival, the showcase for cutting-edge audio, novel multimedia performances and provocative creative discussion has its 2021 installment coming January 7 to the 9th. Streaming at https://live.nationalsawdust.org/,  lineup includes Ash Koosha and his anthropomorphized artificial intelligence YONA independently collaborating for a uniquely futuristic duet concert. The presentation Active Hope brings together  a Broadway director, a poet and TED Global Fellow, and an award winning composer to articulate how artists and arts workers can shape this transformational, historical, and polarizing moment. Featuring artistic leaders from The Apollo Theater, The Kennedy Center, and National Sawdust - Kamilah Forbes, Marc Bamuthi Joseph, and Paola Prestini - in a public conversation about applying creative intelligence to how we cross borders, disciplines, and outlooks as we build a path for healing and the future.

Choreographer and MacArthur Fellow Kyle Abraham and pioneering producer Jlin have come together to create a new commission exploring death, folklore, and reincarnation through a reimagining of Mozart’s Requiem in D minor. While Abraham’s work is typically performed in proscenium, for FERUS he has reconceptualized an excerpt from an evening length work, exploring abstracted movement for the digital landscape. The duet features Keerati Jinakunwiphat and Jae Neal from A.I.M by Kyle Abraham, costumed by highly noted designer Giles Deacon with musical excerpts by producer Jlin. Choreography created in collaboration with A.I.M. dancers Keerati Jinakunwiphat and Jae Neal. A short live discussion with the artists will follow the screening.

National Sawdust's co-founder and Artistic Director Paola Prestini says, "Our sixth annual FERUS Festival is emblematic of the core values we're stressing for National Sawdust's 2021 season: encouraging innovation in form and approach, emphasizing financial and professional mentorship for artists, expanding our work with movement and dance, and intensifying our commitment to spotlight the experience and creative work of a gender-diverse and racially-diverse roster of performers and composers."

To learn more, go to: https://nationalsawdust.org/festivals-and-series/ferus/

National Sawdust's FERUS Festival
January 7 - 9, 2021

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