Wiliamsburg Performance Alliance Annoucnes Schedule for Annual Festvial

With a tip of the hat to the Works Progress Administration, The WPA (Williamsburg Performance Alliance) returns with its annual festival.

The WPA is a network of artists, venues, and arts organizations that formed in 2006 to address individual and community issues and concerns.  Their goal is to share resources and increase the visibility of performing arts in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

On September 27-28 and October 4, The WPA will present The WPA Free Fest, a performance festival that celebrates the important work being created and performed in Williamsburg.  Access to all participating performance spaces and festival activities is free!  By promoting local artists and venues, The WPA Free Fest aims to identify the performing arts as an integral part of what makes Williamsburg an artistic hub within the larger New York City community.

Triskelion Arts, Vampire Cowboys, The Brick, and CAVE are among the Williamsburg-based hosting companies for this year’s weekend-long festival.

Audiences for The WPA Free Fest will be encouraged to walk from space to space, casually dropping in on any given performance all day Saturday and all day Sunday, sampling the varied work which these organizations produce year- round.  Maps to all participating performance spaces will be given out at the L Train subway stops on the above dates.

COMPLETE SCHEDULE:

Sat 9/27

3pm at TRISKELION ARTS:

Triskelion Arts & WAX present Leanne Schmidt and Company, Jonathan Ciccarelli & Dancers, Deborah Karp, white road Dance Media, Elizabeth Dishman/Coriolis Dance, and alexanDance

7:30pm at CAVE:
CAVE in association with Garnica LEIMAY presents:
“Ferment”

A platform for the development of new work, by dancers, actors, and interdisciplinary performers who are students of the NY Butoh-Kan Intensive training sessions. The New York Butoh-Kan: Training Initiative Program (NYBK) strengthens resources for the study of Butoh dance in NY, facilitating rigorous physical training, and enriching students with the first-person historical context from international Butoh masters. September 27 Program: Kristin Narcowich, Susan Mills, Thomas Anerine, Stacy Lynn Smith, Erin Kelly, Yana Kraeva & Sho Ikushima, Megan Nicely, Melissa Lohman, Gillian Lipton.

8pm at TRISKELION ARTS:
Triskelion Arts & WAX present NuDance Theater/Eva Perotta, Sarah Seely, Deborah Karp, Xan Burley, Kristina Skovby, white road Dance Media, and Cirque This

10pm at THE BRICK:
The Brick Theater, Inc. presents New York Clown Theatre Festival Cabaret

Bitter, deformed and rabidly Caucasian scholar Lord Oxford and his faithful Irish adoptee Patty O’Pattiecake host a vicious closing cabaret for your pleasure. Flags will be waved. Candidates will be endorsed. Lines in the sand will be drawn. Guest performers include Red Bastard, John Leo & Peanuckle, 3.5 Heads and others.

Sun 9/28

3pm at TRISKELION ARTS:

Triskelion Arts & WAX present Jessica Gaynor Dance, NuDance Theater/Eva Perotta, Peter Kyle Dance, alexanDance, Elizabeth Dishman/Coriolis Dance, Kristina Skovby

6pm at THE BRICK:

The Brick Theater, Inc. presents
The New York Clown Theatre Festival Clown Funeral & Closing Night Party Theatre Group Dzieci leads the Clown Funeral Procession of The NY Clown Theatre Festival 2008 through the streets of Williamsburg with morbid buffoonery, audience participation and the choral singing of sacred hymns. As clown mourners follow the casket to its final destination at The Brick Theater, the bereaved are likely to cry out in anguish to unsuspecting passersby. At the funeral rite following, clown widows and widowers will remember with great passion the achievements of the festival in its 4 short weeks of life. Be sure to stay after the funeral rite for the traditional Closing Night Party. He would have wanted it so.

7:30pm at CAVE
CAVE in association with Garnica LEIMAY presents:
“Ferment”

A platform for the development of new work, by dancers, actors, and interdisciplinary performers who are students of the NY Butoh-Kan Intensive training sessions. The New York Butoh-Kan: Training Initiative Program (NYBK) strengthens resources for the study of Butoh dance in NY, facilitating rigorous physical training, and enriching students with the first-person historical context from international Butoh masters. September 28 Program: Michelle Beck, Monika Gross, Bill Mullen, Elena Lentiny, Morgan von Prelle Pecelli, Jonothon Howard, Irem Calikusu,Mariko Kurihara, Denisa Musilova .

8pm at TRISKELION ARTS:
Triskelion Arts & WAX present Jessica Gaynor Dance, Cirque This, Leanne Schmidt and Company, Peter Kyle Dance, Jonathan Ciccarelli & Dancers, Sarah Seely

Sat 10/4
8pm at THE BATTLE RANCH ANNEX:

Vampire Cowboys Presents

The Saturday Night Saloon For its seventh season, Vampire Cowboys brings back its monthly party featuring brand new genre bending serialized plays by NYC's hottest indie theatre artists. The shows hit every first Saturday night of the month from September to January. It's always free, the all-you-can-drink beer (or until we run out) is always only a mere five dollars, and the shows are always inventive. So why go drink at a bar when you can party at The Saloon?

This season's Saloon features all new episodic works by: James Comtois, Megan Mostyn-Brown, A. Rey Pamatmat, Robert Ross Parker, Mac Rogers, and Webb Wilcoxen.

More about The WPA and its mission:

Williamsburg, famed for its place in contemporary fine art and indie music, has yet to be recognized as the breeding ground for some of the city’s most exciting alternative performance work.  In over a dozen independently run performance spaces, emerging artists have helped grow this small neighborhood into an essential New York destination.

New zoning laws and bottom-line developers threaten to price-out these performance spaces as leases end in the next few years.  (This situation was recently played out in the Lower East Side theater scene a few years ago.)  In part to preserve these institutions, The WPA hereby begins it campaign to counteract these threats and “free” Williamsburg.

For more information, visit newwpa.org or email info@newwpa.org.