The Shed to Present North American Premiere of Wu Tsang's MOBY DICK; OR, THE WHALE

The Shed will present the North American premiere of MOBY DICK; or, The Whale, a new feature-length silent film by award-winning filmmaker and visual artist Wu Tsang. With original music composed by Caroline Shaw and Andrew Yee with Asma Maroof and conducted by Daniela Candillari, its presentation at The Shed will be performed live by Members of the New York Philharmonic in the Griffin Theater on April 15 at 8 pm; April 16 at 2 pm and 8 pm; and April 17 at 3 pm.

The collective Moved by the Motion, embarks upon the telling of one of the great American novels, Moby Dick by Herman Melville. This adaptation, written by Sophia Al Maria, directed by Tsang, costumed by TELFAR x Kyle Luu, with movement direction by Tosh Basco and choreography by Josh Johnson follows the white whale above and below the surface of the water, developing a visual cosmology that resists the exploration and exploitation of the earth under imperial colonialism. The narrative is interwoven with extracts by the Sub-Sub-Librarian, a character played by Fred Moten, and tackles the novel's subterranean currents, encountering the resistance of the ship's hydrarchy, or organizational structure, and collectives of "mariners, renegades, and castaways," as described by historian CLR James.

The staging of this adaptation by Moved by the Motion pairs the classic story of the whaler's "floating factory" with the beginnings of the film industry in silent film. The film was shot entirely on a sound-stage combining silent-era filmmaking techniques with a virtual reality game engine projecting surreal ocean environments.

"We felt more free in our approach to Moby Dick because it is such a ubiquitous book that has been adapted so many countless times, there was no pressure to be original-which in the end gave us a lot of space to play and be inventive," said director Wu Tsang. "It's a story that is so well known, but also unknown. The book is so juicy and saturated with problems and reflections of its time-but also of our present."

"Wu Tsang has contextualized this age-old story with honest reverence and a gripping new motif for the whale," said Alex Poots, Artistic Director and CEO of The Shed. "The material and the nature of its presentation underline the complexities of this work; it is a mixture of mediums, a new format of illustration juxtaposed with symphonic, melancholic delight. We are pleased to partner with the New York Philharmonic and Whitney Museum on the realization of this work, and look forward to giving the North American premiere at The Shed."

Concurrent with the performance at The Shed, Moved by the Motion will present a video installation at Whitney Biennial 2022: Quiet as It's Kept. The work features extra-narrative and recontextualized material from MOBY DICK; or, The Whale. The Whitney Biennial 2022 opens to the public on April 6 at The Whitney Museum of American Art. Featuring 63 artists and collectives from a variety of generations, working across disciplines and media, the 2022 Biennial reflects the current state of contemporary art in America. For more information, visit whitney.org/exhibitions/2022-biennial.

Whitney Biennial 2022: Quiet as It's Kept is co-organized by David Breslin, DeMartini Family Curator and Director of Curatorial Initiatives, and Adrienne Edwards, Engell Speyer Family Curator and Director of Curatorial Affairs, with Mia Matthias, Curatorial Assistant; Gabriel Almeida Baroja, Curatorial Project Assistant; and Margaret Kross, former Senior Curatorial Assistant.

MOBY DICK; or, The Whale is Produced by the Schauspielhaus Zürich and co-commissioned by LUMA Foundation, Superblue, TBA21-Academy, HARTWIG ART FOUNDATION, The Shed, DE SINGEL, and the Whitney Museum of American Art.

Tickets for MOBY DICK; or, The Whale go on sale March 10 at theshed.org or (646) 455-3494 (presale for Shed members begins March 8).