Past
Join PICA’s Creative Exchange Lab artists in residence for brief presentations about their current projects and practices over happy hour drinks!
Learn moreRenowned dance, performance, and visual artist Eiko Otake discusses her expansive TBA performance and exhibition projects with esteemed Portland-based artist and choreographer, Linda K. Johnson and PICA’s Artistic Director & Curator of Visual Art, Kristan Kennedy.
Learn moreMembers and guest artists of YGB Portland will facilitate a workshop focused on collective healing experiences for intergenerational Black and Brown communities. *Open to BlPOC+ participants only
Learn moreThis event will have ASL interpreters and open captioning. Leading Deaf musician, artist, and advocate Myles de Bastion and their CymaSpace collaborative curate a night of experimental music and sound that centers Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing artists and audiences. Through visual, vibrational, light-based, and other immersive and multi-sensory interpretations and displays of sound, this night of performances will create multiple modes and nodes of access for Deaf and Hearing audiences alike, expanding our notions and perceptions of artistic and experiential possibilities for music and sound art. ASL interpretation, captioning, and other forms of accessibility and accommodation will be provided.
Learn moreEiko Otake collaborates with artists of diverse backgrounds and disciplines, both living and dead, for her evolving Duet Project. Eiko is accompanied by Ishmael Houston -Jones, Marc Mccloughan, Alexis Moh.
Learn moreStarring Anthony Hudson—the human vessel for Portland’s premiere drag clown Carla Rossi—Looking for Tiger Lily (Solo) utilizes song, dance, drag, and video to put a queer spin on the ancestral tradition of storytelling. Asking what it means for a queer, mixed Native person to experience their heritage through white normative culture as they recount growing up watching the 1960 production of Peter Pan featuring Sondra Lee’s blonde, blue-eyed, 'Indian Princess' Tiger Lily, Anthony (and Carla) draws from a songbook stretching across Disney’s Pocahontas to Cher’s "Half- Breed." Not just autobiography, Looking for Tiger Lily (Solo) is a coming-of-age story that's more than cowboys versus Indians.
Learn moreInspired by the Latin word nexus meaning ‘a binding together,’ NEXUS 1 is an experimental exhibition format that aims at linking and merging the works of four European and two US artists, creating a visual-poetical experience in time and space. NEXUS 1 is a collaborative project exploring sensitive issues relevant for the participants, the social groups they belong to, and the current socio-political situation in Europe and the US. Merging different mediums including performance, film, music, installation and poetry in a single work, this collaborative international exchange will be developed during a residency at PICA and PNCA, and exhibited for the first time during the TBA Festival. Curated by Adela Demetja (Tirana / Frankfurt a.M.) with Dante Buu (Rožaje), Raluca Croitoru (Bucharest / Rotterdam) Emily Henderson (Portland), Adrian McBride (Portland), and Selma Selman (Bihac / NYC).
Learn moreTBA artist Myles de Bastion—an artistic director, musician, creative altruist, and advocate for Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing communities—is joined by others working for greater access and inclusion for Disabled artists and audiences. * This conversation will be ASL interpreted
Learn moreSan Cha is a singer-songwriter, based in the City of Angels, increasingly known for her visceral and explosive live performances. Her name, derived from the Spanish word sancha, which translates to ‘mistress’, is a mischievous reference to the title of ‘San’, given to male saints in the Catholic tradition. Fans of cumbia and punk, bolero and electro, flock to see San Cha’s emotional renditions of traditional Mexican rancheras and original songs that queer conventions of identity, power and love. Her striking stage presence is accompanied by the one-of-a-kind garments she adorns, aesthetic reflections of the years spent performing in drag and club scenes in the Bay. San Cha was most recently the headlining act at the kickoff of the 2019 Red Bull Music Festival, with upcoming performances at the Levitt Pavilion, Getty Museum and Santa Monica Pier. Partner Program Presented by lumber room Curated by Libby Werbel In conjunction with their exhibition Kate Newby A puzzling light and moving. Limited seating, no reservations, doors at 6:30
Learn moreIn conversation with Jaclyn I. Pryor, Anthony Hudson / Carla Rossi (Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde) shares insights into the TBA performance Looking for Tiger Lily (Solo), including how the performance serves to queer acenstral storytelling practices, artistic and pop cultural references, and stereotypes of Native identities. * This conversation will be ASL interpreted
Learn morePartner Program Co-presented with Northwest Film Center and JUDY SHAKEDOWN is the story of Los Angeles’ black lesbian strip club scene and its genesis. Owned and operated by women, underground and illegal in nature, the club Shakedown is the darker, faster, younger iteration of this dance culture. The film is a window into this world. Shakedown emerged from a post-RIOTS, post-OJ, post-integration but still very racially divided Los Angeles. In this divided city Shakedown is an independent, all black and all female cash economy. SHAKEDOWN chronicles the explicit performances and personal relationships of the party’s dancers and organizers including Ronnie-Ron, Shakedown Productions’ creator and emcee; Mahogany, the legendary “mother” of the community; Egypt, their star performer; and Jazmine, the “Queen” of Shakedown.
Learn moreTBA:19 Roland Dahwen THE OVERSEAS BANQUET
Learn moreVisiting curator Adela Demetja is joined by Portland-based writer, curator, and artist Lucy Cotter, and collaborating artists from Europe and the U.S. In dialogue, they’ll share more about their residency time in Portland, the contexts and landscapes in which they each live and make work, and their collaborative TBA performance project.
Learn moreEiko Otake presents a screening of a specially edited version of A Body in Fukushima a film created by the artist to be shown either with or without a photo exhibition and/or Eiko's live performance.
Learn moreCurators Stephanie Snyder and Lisa Dent discuss the interdisciplinary exhibition and performance project, The Autopoets, with featured artists Roland Dahwen (Portland, OR) and Tuesday Smillie (NYC). A partnership between Reed College’s Cooley Gallery, Converge 45, and the TBA Festival, The Autopoets is on view at the Cooley Gallery through October 6, 2019.
Learn moreInnovative and celebrated musician, composer, and sound artist Kara-Lis Coverdale shares insights into her creative process and practice, gender in electronic and experimental music, and the ins and outs of her TBA performance--a unique composition for the organ at Portland's First Presbyterian Church--in conversation with Lorna Dune, a local electronic musician, composer, DJ, engineer, producer, and Sonic Arts educator.
Learn moreExperimental composer and improvisor Kara-Lis Coverdale plays an acoustic solo concert on the pipe organ at First Presbyterian Church, co-presented with Variform Gallery.
Learn moreA panel discussion with PICA’s Artistic Directors and other curators and arts administrators to consider how art institutions host, celebrate, and make people feel welcome in their spaces. Moderated by Spencer Byrne-Series, PICA's Exhibitions Director, and curator of TBA:FOOD.
Learn moreChoreographer Ligia Lewis discusses the many layers and references in her TBA performance, Water Will (in melody), with Portland-based scholar bart fitzgerald.
Learn moreUsing mindfulness, somatic, and improvisation-based exercises, this workshop will focus on how embodied practice can be an artistic technology to sharpen and hone our use of attention, both in performance practice and process, and for how we show up in relationships, in communities, and in the world.
Learn morePDXBall presents The Back to School Kiki Ball, a thrilling competition that shows a glimpse of Portland's dynamic Kiki ballroom community. The Kiki ballroom scene is a subculture of the mainstream ballroom world and was created to practice walking or competing in the many ‘categories’ of the international ballroom arena. The theme "Back to School" will influence the decor, competitive categories, and attire of the participants. Spectators and first-time ball attendees are welcome to join in the fun by dressing to the theme. If it is your first time at a ball, you are highly encouraged to attend and cheer on the competitors who have trained for each category. Join us in celebrating a powerful and inspiring community that uplifts and centers queer and trans black, indigenous land, people of color.
Learn moreSix Latinx performers map an elusive choreography of obsessive and perverse action within an unstable terrain of bodies, materials and sounds. Inspired by This Bridge Called my Back - an anthology of feminist essays that explore identity and critique white feminism. West Coast Premiere
Learn moreIn conversation with Reuben Tomás Roqueñi (Yaqui, Mayo, Chicanx), experimental musician, composer, and visual artist Laura Ortman (White Mountain Apache) shares more about her practice, including TBA performance collaborations with Marcus Fischer and Raven Chacon.
Learn moreMiguel Gutierrez and San Cha discuss how queer Latinx experience informs their respective experimental practices in dance and music, including discursive debates around aesthetics, abstraction, and cultural identity in performance making.
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