NEW YORK LIVE ARTS Presents Souleymane Badolo and Cynthia Oliver, 4/25-27

New York Live Arts will present two works by Souleymane Badolo, including Buudou, BADOO, BADOLO and the world premiere of BARAK, with an opening performance of Cynthia Oliver's BOOM! , April 25 - 27 at 7:30pm. Described by the New York Times as possessing a "voluptuous, muscular stage presence," Badolo has created his newest work BARAK as an acknowledgement towards the individuals who have helped him since he moved from Burkina Faso to the U.S. four years ago. The title of the work loosely translates as "gratitude" in his native Gurunsi.

Tracing the journey of his great-great-grandfather, the other work Badolo will present, Buudou, BADOO, BADOLO, was originally presented in 2012 at Harlem Stage. It is a reflection on the lessons Badolo's father taught him and the responsibility he feels to his own son in regards to their ancestry. His African heritage and the Gurunsi divination system bagger, a ritual where form and structure are suggested through the meaning inherent in thrown cowrie shells, are driving forces behind Badolo's artistic work.

BOOM!, a duet by Cynthia Oliver featuring Oliver and Leslie Cuyjet, will open the performance program. The seed of a larger work to come, BOOM! exposes and manipulates notions of building a life and a relationship-of a woman to herself, her history, her present and her future. Negotiating and renegotiating the rules of personhood, fate and consequence, BOOM! simultaneously reveals, resists and submits to the structures and shape of a performance.

Performances will take place in New York Live Arts' Theater. Come Early Conversations and Stay Late Discussions will also be featured with two shows, as well as a related Shared Practice Workshop (see complete schedule below). Tickets are $20 and $15. Tickets may be purchased online at tickets.newyorklivearts.org, by phone at 212-924-0077 and in person at the box office. Box office hours are Monday to Friday from 1 to 9pm, and Saturday and Sunday from 12 to 8pm.

BARAK is commissioned by New York Live Arts and made possible, in part, by the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York State Council on the Arts, and the Jerome Foundation. Additional support is given by contributors to the Dance Theater Workshop Commissioning Fund at New York Live Arts.