OBJECT OF HER AFFECTION to Play REDCAT, 7/30-8/2

Part puppetry, part performance art, Marsian De Lellis' Object of Her Affection is a visual narrative about Object Sexuals - humans who form intimate relationships with inanimate objects. Following sold-out workshop performances, an excerpt of Object of Her Affection will be presented Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, July 30, August 1 and 2 at 8:30pm at REDCAT NOWFest (New Original Works Festival) 2014: Program 2 on a shared program with hybrid performances by Carole Kim, and d. Sabela Grimes. REDCAT is located at 631 West 2nd St., Los Angeles, CA 90012, 213-237-2800. Tickets can be purchased at http://www.redcat.org/event/nowfest-2014-week-two.

In childhood, Andrea finds solace in her first love, a baby blanket. Through adolescence, she is attracted to a bad-boy hunting rifle and later becomes infatuated with a controversial wall. In adulthood, Andrea seeks companionship with monumental structures: a high-profile statue, tragic twin skyscrapers, an unfaithful bridge, and a crumbling tenement, which ultimately fails her.

Object of Her Affection was initially developed during the National Puppetry Conference at the Eugene O'Neill Theatre Center in 2012 under the mentorship of playwright/marionettist, Ronnie Burkett. Since then, the work has been further developed during De Lellis' recent residency at Automata.

Inspired by such documentaries as Agnieszka Piotrowska's Married to the Eiffel Tower about women who fall in love with large objects, and Alison de Fren's Mechanical Bride, which focuses on high-end sex dolls, Object of Her Affection responds to an increasing melding of humans and that which surrounds them.

Marsian De Lellis is a visual and interdisciplinary performance artist, who constructs visual narratives centered on seemingly "weird" people that illuminate something essential about contemporary life. De Lellis' performances have toured throughout the United States, Canada, and Edinburgh; and his installations have been featured in Scar Of Visibility and Women And Performance. . As a visiting lecturer, De Lellis has presented an artist-talk Object/Fetish: Staging the Suspension of Disbelief in Everyday Life at the prestigious Maryland Institute of the Arts (MICA), Calgary's Club Sapien, and UNIMA's Puppetry and Post-Dramatic Performance Conference.

In the current phase of development, De Lellis has collaborated with Michele Spears, a theatre director, choreographer, actress, and arts educator based in Los Angeles. Spears has been a guest artist at the O'Neill Theatre Center's National Puppetry Conference and is a founding member of Impro Theatre, a Los Angeles based company specializing in narrative improvisational works, as well as a founding partner with Page One Productions.

Object of Her Affection is made possible through generous support from The Jim Henson Foundation, The Automata Residency Program, an ARC grant from the Center for Cultural Innovation, the National Puppetry Conference at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center, and funding from The Anna Sosenko Assist Trust with additional support of time and space from Impro Theater and REDCAT. Additional fundraising is now underway through Hatchfund.org (http://www.hatchfund.org/project/marsian_delellis_object_of_her_affection_workshop).

The Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater (REDCAT) is an interdisciplinary contemporary arts center for innovative visual, performing and media arts located in downtown Los Angeles inside the Walt Disney Concert Hall complex. Each season REDCAT presents a far-reaching roster of work by globally renowned artists, inside one of the most versatile and technologically advanced presentation spaces in the world. For information about REDCAT, visit redcat.org.

Object of Her Affection performance schedule:
REDCAT NOWFest Performances:
Thursday, July 30 @ 8:30pm
Friday, August 1 @ 8:30pm
Saturday, August 2 @ 8:30pm