The Department of Performing and Media Arts (PMA)
presents

Water

An Immersive Media Art Installation

Conceived by:
Shanti Pillai

Installation Designers:
Thea Goldman, Anastasia Kreisel

Video Art:  
Mara Alper, Shanti Pillai, Students of Production Media Lab

Black Box Theatre
Schwartz Center for the Performing Arts 430 College Avenue
April 22, 7:00 p.m.
April 23, 7:00 p.m.

The vision of the Department of Performing and Media Arts is to nurture and mentor artists, performers, writers, and thinkers through the process of event programming. We recognize that all people should see their stories represented, and envision their stories as valuable.

We commit ourselves to creating spaces that actively seek to break down systems of oppression based on race, gender, sexuality, class, ability, and place of origin and empower all to be involved. We seek to stimulate thoughtful discussion and enact social change within our productions and our audiences. It is our goal to make our events accessible to the wider Cornell and Ithaca community, to strengthen bonds and engage inquiry, dialogue, and impact around social and cultural change.
 
In the 2021-2022 academic year we will help realize a wide range of students’ creative projects, from original plays, to solo performances, to readings, to choreographies, to acting, directorial, and curatorial projects. We are particularly happy that in addition to supporting live performances, we are now also supporting the production of several student thesis films. Enjoy the shows!

Water began with the impulse to understand the consciousness of water, to contact its intelligent liquidity through performance. After all, 70% of our planet and of our bodies is water. We drink it, we pump it, we contaminate it, we waste it. We name its chemical parts, we harness it to various ends, we put it at the center of our apocalyptic visions for the future. Yet even as we subject it to so much engineering, science, carelessness, and imagination, do we really know it? Water sought to navigate the seas of our ignorance about what sustains life through the telling of stories, poetry, singing, and dancing. In the liveness of a collective body, as performers we could embody our primal gratitude for water’s graceful and dangerous power of plentitude and dissolution.

However, an art project frequently takes on a life of its own, demanding agility and calm of its makers in the face of the unexpected. Water was no different. A journey that began with the destination of a multi-media, live performance work needed to be remapped quickly. It eventually found its arrival in an immersive installation. In some ways the process of the work mirrored the nature of the element it was meant explore: motile, playful, terrifying and utterly necessary. It is often in the encounter with the unexpected that creativity arises. In the course of making the piece, collaborators Thea Goldman, Anastasia Kreisel and I made use of ourselves in ways we couldn’t have imagined. And we discovered delightful partnerships in the students of Waylon Wilson’s Media Production Laboratory class, in video artist Mara Alper, and in musicians Warren Cross and Chris Christiansen. I hope our viewers will find inspiration for reflection as they wander through the theatrical space we have created.

Yet a black box without performers does feel a bit lonely. I can’t help but find it ironic that in paying homage to the basis of our life, the live body should be so absent.

- Shanti Pillai

Shanti Pillai - Collaborating Guest Artist
Shanti Pillai is an artist and scholar and has taught students from thirty countries. She holds a PhD in Performance Studies from New York University and is currently Assistant Professor of Theatre at Williams College, where she teaches dramatic theory, Asian American performance, and collaborative performance making. Her movement classes with actors and visual artists draw from bharatanatyam, yoga, Grotowski, Rasaboxes, and butoh. Shanti is a bharatanatyam dancer trained by the great T. Balasaraswati’s two senior disciples, Nandini Ramani of Chennai and Priyamvada Sankar of Montreal.  She has also worked in contemporary dance, performing from 1991-1996 with the Frente de Danza Independiente in Ecuador. From 2005-2015 she lived and worked for extensive periods in Cuba, collaborating with dancers and actors to create and perform in original works.  In 2016 she co-founded, along with actor Marc Gomes, Third Space Performance Lab, a collective dedicated to exploring how underlying principles of traditional Indian performance forms can inform experimental, contemporary theatrical languages. Shanti’s writing has appeared in The Drama Review, Conversations Across the Field of Dance Studies, Theatre Topics, Women and Performance, the Dance Research Journal, Trialog, and the blog of the Michigan Quarterly.  In 2018 Shanti was awarded a Fulbright Research Grant for her book project on women artists’ contributions to contemporary performance in India across the genres of theater, dance, and performance art. 

Thea Goldman - Installation Designer
Thea Goldman is a senior PMA major, with a concentration in design. You might have previously seen her design work here at Cornell, in Reach for the Sky (2021), and The Nether (2019). She also had the opportunity to work as an assistant technical director and scene shop intern at the Hangar theater this past summer. Post-grad, Thea is excited to be attending graduate school at Brooklyn College, in the Theatrical Design MFA program. Outside of the theatre world, Thea spends her time hiking, watching 80's crime procedurals, and hanging out with her pet bunny, Jojo. She would like to thank Shanti and Jason for their guidance and gumption throughout this process.

Anastasia Kreisel - Installation Designer
Anastasia Kreisel is a senior from Atlanta, Georgia, double majoring in Psychology and PMA, with minors in Education and Human development. Within PMA, she focuses on lighting, whether it be design, or working with the electrics crew to hang lighting for shows in the department. She designed lighting for spit fire, drink gasoline and Reach for the Sky, and is looking forward to designing for Water. After graduation, she will be attending the University of Georgia for a master’s degree in Educational Psychology focusing on Quantitative Methods. She would like to thank her parents, boyfriend, and friends for all their continued support.

PMA 1410 – Media Production Lab:
Taylor Bazos, Allison Borton, Matthew Davis, Lucas Esponda, Jordan Ferrell, Ishini Gammanpila, Gillian Harrill, Vera Liu , Allan Mezhibovsky, Oliver Moura, Isabella Ogbolumani, Rin Park, Seeha Park, Annie Riedel, Yingyi Shu, Orion Tian
 
PMA 1610 - Technical Production Lab:  
Sofia Aguirre, Erin Brickle, Kit Ellsworth, Hayden Garniewicz, Daniella Gonzalez, Aidan Herz, Hannah McManus, Jillian Parrino, Katrina Peterson, Saif Quraishi, Maxwell Ringer, Grayson Rosenberg, Noah Rubinstein, Bonny Wong, Vannessa Wong, Angela Yuan

Scene Shop Work-Study:  
David Bascom, Arianna Louise Marie Josue, Julianna K. Lee, Charlie Wright

Props & Paint Work-Study: Jessica Ritchie

Electrics Work-Study: 
Emlen Brown, Anastasia Kreisel, Matthew Secondine, Ariel Shaked Costume First Hands: Emma Kindig, Lillian Liu, Bella Peters, Simone White

BUILDING/HOUSE MANAGERS:
Sofia Aguirre, Mackenzie Closson, Naomi Daniel, Samantha Granja, Deepak Ilango, Anastasia Kreisel, Jack McManus, Maxwell Ringer, Matthew Saylor, Ariel Shaked, Sarah Zaragoza-Smith

PRODUCTION STAFF
Director of Productions and Events: Pamela Lillard
Technical Director: Fritz Bernstein
Assistant Technical Director: Savannah Relos
Props Coordinator: Tim Ostrander
Costume Shop Supervisor: Lisa Boquist
Master Electrician: Steven Blasberg
Computer Support: Chris Christensen
Communications Manager: Gary Gabisan
Performance & Events Coordinator: Youngsun Palmer
Box Office Manager: Julie Tibbits