Skip to main contentWhen PICA announced that it was going to launch a performance festival, too many people asked whether it would work. Typical. The fact of the matter is that it must work if Portland is ever to be taken seriously as an arts magnet city. The shoddy demise of PSU's PIPFest (blame can be lain in all quarters) did not bode well for Sumptown. But up pops PICA with a festival schedule of events that demands the city's attention and complete support.
The first (and, God willing, annual) TBA Festival is an exciting roster of events performed by some of the most important artists of the day. And there really is something for everyone, from hip-hop choreography to a miniature grand opera performed with clothespins.
First, there's the list for dance. The Salia nï Seydou company from Burkina Faso will perform their piece Figninto, while acclaimed Australian choreographer Ros Warby makes a second appearance in Portland with Swift. There's also Bill Shannon, a.k.a. Crutchmaster, a hip-hop mover who performs astonishing feats with the aid of his crutches (he suffers from hip and spine ailments).
From the UK, Akram Khan will stage his first full-length piece, Kaash. Considered by many critics to be the best young choreographer working in Britain today, Khan has collaborated on Kaash with composer Nitin Sawhney and famed sculptor Anish Kapoor.
The Japanese-American movement artists Eiko and Koma will pull into town with their Caravan Project. Inspired by the mobile "paper theater" puppet shows of Japan, the pair have constructed a performance space within the confines of a U-Haul trailer whose sides can be opened. Using intimacy and drama, Eiko and Koma have forged a singular performance style that blends elements of both Eastern and Western performance.
Famous for his work with Bill T. Jones and Heidi Latsky, as well as for being a 350-pound dancer, Lawrence Goldhuber stages his one-man piece, The Life and Times of Barry Goldhubris. Goldhuber is an amazing and fearless performer worth seeking out.
Among the more theatrical offerings, including Coco Fusco's The Incredible Disappearing Woman and Compañia Nacional de Teatro de Mexico's El Automovil Gris (a collision of performance and a silent film), there's the wild and charming Love's Fowl. Susan Vitucci's miniature grand opera on the adventures of La Pulcina Piccola (Chicken Little) has been gaining legions of fans. Live video picks up the styrofoam-and-clothespin puppet actors as they sing their way (in Italian, naturally) through passion and adventure.
In a similar vein, Seattle's Hinterland Theater Association brings The Wreck of the St. Nikolai, an opera for small objects scored by the Black Cat Orchestra.
There's music, too, and it's revolutionary. Haitian-American composer Daniel Bernard Roumain is changing the face of classical music as much as Indian-American pianist Vijay Iyer is altering jazz. And the new sound emanating out of Miami right now owes much to DJ Le Spam, who will take over TBA's cabaret space.
Times and venues are still being decided upon, but the TBA Festival is worth seeking out. PICA threatens to put Portland on the performance map once again, and you can say you helped it happen.
PICA at various venues, Sept. 12-21.
WWeek 2015