(In)Visible

(In)Visible was built in collaboration with artists Jorge Cousineau (Subcircle) and Tania Isaac (Tania Isaac Dance). We were examining individual and collective ideas of identity as it pertains to culture, sexuality, and race. Inspired by my own life of paradoxes: as an openly gay African American ballet dancer with a white husband, working in an art form that remains predominantly European in identity. I grew up in the South in a family of very meager means, but my work brought him to the North and placed him in the socio-economic context of Philadelphia’s cultural elite.

(In)Visible explores the construct of modern identity, teasing apart the internal aspirations and the external forces that shape our choices. Our ability to embody multiple identities can produce a masking effect, wherein one identity may become outwardly invisible to some. We are all, at times, invisible.

Commissioned and Presented By: Annenberg Center “By Local” Series

Length: 45 Minutes

Choreographic Collaborator: Tania Isaac

Music: Jorge Cousineau, Ezio Bosso

Text: Tania Isaac, Meredith Rainey

Lighting Design: Dominic Chacon

Costume Inspiration: Martha Chamberlain

Dancers: Tania Isaac, Meredith Rainey

Premiere: April 1, 2015 - Zellerbach Theater, Annenberg Center, Philadelphia, PA

Text from (In)Visible

The Question

(By Meredith Rainey)

Where do you put the anger?

Where should it go, so you don't explode

Or implode

Or run

Or freeze in place.

Where do you put the anger?

That was born with you.

Anger that you did not seek,

But was there for you to have

To mold you,

To push you,

To define you,

To comfort you, to use you?

What comfort is that?

The comfort in thinking you are alone and right.

Alone and righteous.

I am right.

Where do you put the anger?

To be happy, where would you put the anger?

To be free, where would you put the anger?

You speak.

You bark.

You stand.

You swear.

But do they listen, do they hear?

Did I listen? Did I hear?

I have one life where do I put the anger?

Two in the One

(By Meredith Rainey)

Brought into a world made of possibilities, almosts, hopes, seconds

-From the inception you are strong – change that

-From the inception you are slave – absorb that

Brought into a world made of centuries of l and left behinds, generosity, leftovers, compassions

-From the inception you are needed – flip that

-From the inception you are second – deal with that

Possible almosts, hopeful seconds, leftover generosity and left behind compassions.

There will always be one question in the two.

Which will we I you be?

Without you I us there would be so much less

Embrace that

Now

- Embrace it, know your strength.

-How do you absorb that?

-How do you celebrate that?

REVIEW

The Philadelphia Inquirer by Nancy Heller

Collaboration and Contrast

...Increased the emotional impact of the exquisite final image...