Lone Wolf Tribe's HOBO GRUNT CYCLE Opens Tonight at Dixon Place

Challenging war's legitimacy with Lone Wolf Tribe's signature puppets and poetic imagery, Hobo Grunt Cycle is a theatrical circus pantomime compassionately focusing on a path to peace.

Forging empathic links between wounded soldiers and rescued fighting dogs, writer, performer & director Kevin Augustine premieres his tribe's latest work in a NY debut and a Dixon Place commission. Augustine, as a silent tramp, alongside a foam-rubber cast of life-sized Pit Bulls, disabled American veterans and a cadre of competing circus clowns, exposes the post-war legacy of soldiers while raising questions about peace and healing in our daily lives. A guest speaker series, The Pathway to Peace, in collaboration with Brooklyn for Peace will follow select shows, including Captain Paul K. Chappell, Veterans for Peace, Claude AnShin Thomas of the Zaltho Foundation and Military Families Speak Out.

The calendar for the Pathway To Peace speaking series is as follows:

Friday, February 28

NO SPEAKER

Saturday, March 1

Bill Gilson & Frank Stearns - Veterans For Peace

Friday, March 7

Lionelle Hamanaka - Military Families Speak Out

Saturday, March 8

Paul K. Chappell - Nuclear Age Peace Foundation

Friday, March 14

Claude AnShin Thomas - Zaltho Foundation

Saturday, March 15

Claude AnShin Thomas - Zaltho Foundation

Kevin Augustine: Kevin Augustine is founding Artistic Director of Lone Wolf Tribe, a theatre ensemble blending history, sociology and life-sized puppetry into brutally poetic contemporary narratives. Harnessing the power of visual storytelling with meticulous craft, physical rigor and decidedly dark humor, LWT aims to investigate, challenge and spellbind while speaking compassionately to our collective human experience. Acting as playwright, director, puppet maker and performer, Augustine's life-long storytelling passion was ignited as a boy when his grandmother made him a hand-stitched sock puppet. Trained as an actor and self-taught as a puppet artist, Augustine founded LWT in 1997. Augustine's extraordinary partnership with his foam creations is predicated on a puppet's inherent magic, coupled with the deep power of theatrical possibility. Having written and performed 7 full-length Lone Wolf Tribe shows, Augustine devotes 1-3 years to full realize each new work, with an evolving thematic scope traversing monotheism's ancient beginnings to the current US Veteran suicide epidemic. In addition to Hobo Grunt Cycle other works created at the LWT's studio residence in A.R.T./NY's South Oxford Space include BRIDE (PS122 commission) and The God Projekt (La MaMa), 4 STARS/Critic's Pick by Time Out New York: "One of the most startlingly intense shows I've seen." A 3-time MacDowell Colony fellow, Augustine recently toured Sweden with Pontus Lidberg Dance as puppet director for SNOW. He is a principal puppeteer at the Metropolitan Opera, creative consultant to companies devising their own work, and offers puppet workshops in both technique and construction. Augustine's work has been published, commissioned and performed on both coasts as well as internationally in Brazil, Holland and Africa; awards include: Overall Excellence Award for Solo Show/NYC Fringe; Critics' Choice Award & Sold-Out Citation/SF Fringe; UNIMA Award for Excellence in Puppetry and named "Top 10 Best Show" by TimeOut New York.

Lone Wolf Tribe: Lone Wolf Tribe is a multi-disciplinary theatre ensemble based in Brooklyn, NY, helmed by artistic director Kevin Augustine. With meticulous craft, physical rigor and decidedly dark humor, Lone Wolf Tribe brings life to contemporary stories that investigate, challenge and spell bind. Harnessing the transformative power of visual storytelling since 1997, LWT's brutally poetic productions fuse history, psychology and life-sized puppetry into complex, intelligent narratives that unabashedly embrace art as a catalyst for social change and speak to our collective human experience. LWT has been funded with over 27 grants and fellowships from arts foundations and government councils including USArtists International, The Jim Henson Foundation, The Jerome Foundation, The Greenwall Foundation, NYSCA, The Nancy Quinn Fund, Brooklyn Arts Council, The Axe Houghton Foundation, Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, The Puffin Foundation and Puppeteers of America. The Tribe has toured both coasts with seven original, full-length productions to PS122, HERE, The Brick, Dixon Place, La MaMa, The National Puppetry Festival, The Painted Bride and EXIT Theatre; internationally at festivals in Africa, Europe and Brazil. Works have been published (Plays and Playwrights '05, Indie Theater Now) with residencies and commissions from Dixon Place, PS122, HERE Arts Center (Harp Fellow), St. Ann's Warehouse (Labapalooza), The Ontological Hysteric Theatre (Incubator), The Henson Foundation (Carriage House series), Brooklyn Arts Exchange and Abrons Art Center. LWT also offers monthly classes in puppet-sculpting and animation technique. www.lonewolftribe.com

Dixon Place Presents the New York Premiere of

Lone Wolf Tribe's Hobo Grunt Cycle

Fridays & Saturdays @ 7:00

Feb 28, March 1, 7, 8, 14, & 15

$16 in advance / $20 at door / $12 students, seniors, veterans

Dixon Place

161A Chrystie Street

New York City

212 219-0736

dixonplace.org

@dixonplace