Gentle readers, Aisle Say issues a warning to all those faint of heart, who feast on lobster dinners and, most expressly, who are life members of PETA. Quickly and resolutely I say, please turn the page from this otherwise trenchant, provocative and informative column.
The LiveArts-Fringe Festival inhabits Philadelphia and its environs from Sept. 3 – 18. Audience members should be prepared for some of the East Coast's edgiest and creative dance, theatre and multi-media presentations.
I asked co-founder and Artistic Director Nick Stuccio to recollect one of the more outrageous pieces of art from the past 15 years. It seems one Roderico Garcia, a Spaniard, created an interesting take on the world's food chain. In front of a nightly audience, he would bring out a humongous lobster. Garcia would then go into a long dissertation about the crustacean in an attempt to humanize it to the audience. He even went so far as to put the microphone up to its armored heart so everyone could hear it beat. With that he would pirouette and an assistant would appear from back stage wheeling in a boiling tank of water. Garcia would plunk said crustacean into the steaming bubbles. He would simmer him/her for a time, yank him out and then cut him up. A few minutes Garcia would sit down for din din in front of the stunned audience.
That is what you call Performance Art with an exclamation! (The organizing body was in fact sued by PETA but they held their ground).
LiveArts-Fringe is two different festivals running concurrently over sixteen days. LiveArts is a collection of the world’s best contemporary performing artists that are curated and selected by Stuccio. He literally travels the world throughout the year to see groups up close. The mission of the Philadelphia Live Arts Festival is to commission, develop, and present a wide range of the latest cutting-edge, high-quality performance. Many countries, most notably The Netherlands, the United Kingdom and Spain, support their artists with plane fare.
The Philly Fringe -180 degrees away - is an unfiltered festival where new and established artists present their work free of a selection process. For some, participating in the Festival is a once-a-year or once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to create a show; for the many professional companies participating, it can be an opportunity to work through new concepts and ideas and join the fray.
