Concrete Comedy (2.13.10, 6-10pm)

Video and Performance Art by:
Ann Hirsch (Syracuse, NY)
Shepherd Alligood (Nashville, TN)
Brett Williams (Saint Louis, MO)
Amelia Winger-Bearskin (Nashville, TN)

As David Robbins put it in his article, “Concrete Comedy: A Primer”, concrete comedy is comedy that doesn’t rely on the suspension of disbelief. It’s hard to define and often overlooked when found, because it’s everywhere. Humor in a non-narrative or anti-illusionistic form is not necessarily set apart from everyday life like so much “museum ready” art is. The pieces in Open Lot’s Concrete Comedy go beyond the comedic object, utilizing the distinction between natural and fabricated situations and even the documentation of wry-smiling awkwardness.

Concrete Comedy will premiere Ann Hirsch’s (working here as performance artist-character “Anni Hi”) 90-minute one woman play-performance, “Scandalishious: Behind The Camwhore”, which dramatizes her real-life experiences as a YouTube “cewebrity slut”.

Anni Hi:
“In 2008 I began vlogging on YouTube as eighteen-year-old college freshman Caroline, aka SCANDALISHIOUS. Through dance, song, emo whining and copious ass shaking, I, as Caroline, found myself at the center of a viral movement, filled with dedicated fans and cynical haters. SCANDALISHIOUS: Behind the Camwhore chronicles my journey through this space of anonymity, desire and personal expression.

Viewers watch me perform as Scandalishious, in front of my webcam, with a projected live feed of my desktop as I talk to my audience, dance for them, watch homemade fan videos and gchat with fans and enemies. As the story unfolds, the audience finds me ensnared in a cyber affair with a fan that begins to bleed into my “real” life as “Ann” as well as see me entangled in a web of lies with an alleged fan, who attempts to blackmail Caroline into doing things she is not prepared to do….

The play explores female sexual and emotional web presence, how it can be beneficial and how it can be harmful for the women involved. It questions the existence of performativity itself as well as power structures as they exist on the internet. The performance plays with the idea of my “real” identity as it intersects with my own vulnerability and culpability.”

6PM: Amelia Winger-Bearskin pulls an Andy Kaufman as avatar “Amelia Coleslaw” inside the MMORPG Second Life.
6PM: Brett Williams speaks the language of French New Wave pluralism in his shameless-self-promotional BRETT commercials.
6PM: Emerging artist Shepherd Alligood befuddles the concept of the Confessional.

ALL LIVE AT OPEN LOT AND IN 3-D!!!

Wine and beer will be served with I.D. This is an all ages and free event occurring at Open Lot Nashville one-night only, 2.13.10.

Curated by Jonathan Lisenby and Open Lot.

Open Lot Nashville
1307 Jewell Street
Nashville, TN 37207
www.theopenlot.org