Sunday, June 7 at 7:00pm | $5 |
Suite Sandy Boulevard, devised by Portland-based artist Lou Watson, is an experimental concert inspired by place and incorporating sound (including sopranos and a leaf blower) and movement. Suite Sandy Boulevard is presented one night only.
The work takes NE Sandy Boulevard (specifically between 57th and 82nd Avenues) as its theme. Suite Sandy Boulevard features dances inspired by early morning leaf-blowers, operatic vocals (using billboards as lyrics) and guessing-games featuring iconic NE Sandy Boulevard storefronts. Combining music, video, statistical data, and dance, the performance is at turns humorous and thought-provoking.
"It is both a celebration and an investigation of human curiosity and how we can continuously find ways to experience joy and wonder (in even the most humdrum of circumstances)," says Watson. "The suite has eight movements and features an ensemble of four percussionists, three sopranos, three dancers, and one pianist/leaf-blower operator."
About the Artist
Lou Watson is an interdisciplinary artist who last year was a fellow with the Oregon Heritage Society producing the artist-as-researcher project; Roadside Attraction: Situational Aesthetics and Place-Identity of NE Sandy Boulevard (57th to 82nd), Portland, Oregon. Her film of NE Sandy Boulevard, commute, won the John Cage Award for Synesthesia at the 41st NW Filmmakers Festival. Watson’s work is about exploring her immediate environment through humor and sideways looking to find joy and wonder in the everyday.