TAG SALE COSMOLOGY

The Kate Bush Dance Troupe at 179 Canal

Photos above by Brina Thurston. Below, video documentation (by Andrew Steinmetz) of our second performance on May 30th at 179 Canal, a temporary gallery and performance space hosted by Margaret Lee. The month of programming was called The Month of May - read an interview with Margaret on the Art:21 blog HERE. For this iteration, members Renata Espinoza and Margaret Lee bowed out and were replaced by Cassie Thornton and Kate Scherer. Jennifer Sullivan, Samara Davis, and myself remained. Check out the video footage in order of presentation with a brief explanation of each number below.

Link: Photo set from The Month of May.

Wuthering Heights
We began the evening with an encore presentation of Wuthering Heights, enhanced by a lovely red sleeve-and-sash accessory made by Samara Davis. Kate Scherer’s abstract video played on the wall to our right (you can’t see it here due to the angle at which the footage was recorded).

Hounds of Love
Samara Davis came up with the moves for this piece, combining ghoul-like hound movements with doo-wop style snapping and bouncing. She also made an eyepiece for each dancer, which, in tandem with black gloves scouted by Kate Scherer, contribute a gang/posse element. Cassie Thornton’s slideshow video plays offscreen.

Room for the Life
This song did not have a Kate Bush-choreographed dance to work from, so Jennifer Sullivan used a live performance video as a jumping-off point. In the video, Kate leans and rocks in a womb-like structure, so Jen created quilted pregnant bellies for us to wear. The dance moves are alternately sexy and maternal, climaxing in a birth sequence. Maya Erdelyi provided liquid light visuals for this womb-tastic number.

The Dreaming
Source material was ample for this piece - in addition to the awesome sci-fi video Kate created for this song, there are a few great live television performance recordings as well. I faithfully transcribed the moves directly from these performances and crafted costumes that are simplified versions of those worn by Kate and her dancers. Add a smoke machine and we’re good to go!

Thanks to the DJs and those who helped out as stagehands!

Link: First Kate Bush Dance Troupe Performance

Sarah Brightman & Hot Gossip

I was searching the world wide web for pictures of Kate Bush the other day and stumbled into photos of this spacey lady:

To my surprise, it turned out to be Sarah Brightman, one of my dad’s fave divas. She played the lead role in Phantom of the Opera - her husband Andrew Lloyd Webber was the composer and creator, and the role was written specifically for her. These days she enjoys success as a soprano siren-diva blending classical and pop influences. I guess when you look into the range of styles she has experimented with in her career, it should come as no surprise that she first met with success as a disco dancer - still, it kinda made me chuckle.

Sarah debuted as a member of Hot Gossip, a British dance troupe that was led and choreographed by Arlene Phillips. Their performances were super glittery disco numbers with a sci-fi tilt that were bursting with sexual energy. Hot Gossip was showcased on the Kenny Everett Video Show in the late 70s and the troupe released a few singles with Sarah as their songstress - see I Lost My Heart to a Starship Trooper below. I’m also including their video for Supernature by Cerrone.

See early-sarah-brightman.com for more info about Hot Gossip.

I Lost My Heart to a Starship Trooper

Supernature (includes a bit of footage of Kenny Everett at the end)

More Public Access Gold

This video is an unidentified cable access clip from Pittsfield (assuming Pittsfield, MA, but perhaps not) dubbed “What’s Your Problem?”
for reasons that will become clear whence you begin your viewing experience. Truly a tasty absurdist nugget that surprisingly does not get old. Brought to my attention by youtube (and real) friend Sophia Peer who had favorited it.

Stairway to Stardom

A month or two ago, my coworker Steve sent me a couple of videos of a public access show Stairway to Stardom that had been posted on youtube. Public access programming holds a special place in my heart, and this was aired in Manhattan, where I also have a video in rotation as a “filler” for weird late-night slots of dead air. I recently went back to youtube for a more in-depth survey of the show’s offerings and found it to be an enriching and engrossing research experience. Many of the acts created lasting memories in my mind, but some of those were quite unpleasant - think offensively bad stand-up comedy (and lots of it) and young boys crooning and warbling. Behold those that made the most favorable impression.

You can also find a brief NPR story on the show produced by Jennifer Sharpe. Most of the clips come from what appears to be her youtube channel, titled Sharpeworld.

Stairway to Stardom (1993) - Lola Perazzo

Stairway to Stardom (1984) - Lucille Cataldo

Stairway to Stardom (1983) - Reason to Live

Stairway to Stardom (1988) - Horowitz and Spector

Performance at U Wisconsin-Madison’s Starlight Cinema

I’m performing along with artist Shana Moulton this Thursday in Madison. In addition to some, er, classics, I’ll be performing a new piece, for which I made a new costume (see above). I have to admit - I’m pretty impressed with myself. My costumes are actually beginning to turn out as I had envisioned them!

Here are the deets:

Shana Moulton & Erica Magrey
a night of live performances

Thursday, March 26, 2009
8 pm - 915 pm
Starlight Cinema
Memorian Union: Fredric March Play Circle
University of Wisconsin
Madison, WI

nyc video and performance artists shana moulton & erica magrey will each
perform individual sets and then come together for a rare, starlight-only
surprise collaboration. this is sure to be an evening of full impact head-on
collision wizardry so don’t miss it!

shana moulton will perform a piece titled “body ÷ mind + 7 = spirit.” in
this performance, shana brings her alter ego, cynthia, and her strange world
to life through an innovative use of props, costumes, live-action and
projected video. the performance weaves an abstract narrative out of
exercise equipment, carpal-tunnel therapy, goddess worship, the new-age pop
music of enigma, angela lansbury, the thousand-hand bodhisattva dance and
brian de palma’s carrie.

erica magrey will appear as her alter ego, metalmags, in a performance
titled “window.” here, a collage of personas, reflections and realizations
emerges as stories of transformation and empowerment are told through
movement, light, and sound. using performance, video, and songs, she creates
a psychedelic journey of self-discovery, engaging themes such as self-doubt,
nostalgia and personal mythology.

p.s. this event is free

MIA is a goddess, obviously

This is way overdue, as everyone saw or heard about uber-pregnant MIA performing at the Grammys and reportedly experiencing contractions while there (she has since given birth). But when I came across this flashmob video by Oxfam it reminded me of how fucking cool MIA is. And also that she wore the most amazing uber-pregnant woman dress of all time, or certainly the best in our time. The designer is House of Holland, and for the decision to dress a pregnant woman in it, we can thank MIA’s forward-thinking stylist.

Whoop Dee Doo Deitch Holiday Party

(photo by Gabi Porter)

Christmas and New Year’s may already seem like faded memories, wistful days off that expired worlds ago, but in the spirit of better-late-than-never, I’m happy to share some photos from our performance at the Deitch Holiday Party at Santos Party House. The event was led by Jaimie Warren and Matt Roche, the creators of Whoop Dee Doo, a faux public access show based in Kansas City. My friend Jennifer (Sullivan) had seen a posting about the show on Craigslist and referred Jaimie to me as a potential performer. At first I was planning some sort of musical skit, but both feeling aimless and short on time, Jen and I decided to join forces. The result of our efforts was Holiday Hoopla, a holiday-themed game show featuring holiday trivia, name that tune, and a password-style segment. Jen was our red afro-ed hostess, Andrew her lovely assistant, and Erika, Dustin, and Shaina were our multicultural house band. Game play was between us (Metalmags and the Alien Ambassador), dubbed The Visitors, and our rivals The Kids - Raven and Amber Ferguson. The Christmas Banana (Sophia Peer) also made a rousing appearance as the crowd (unprovoked) chanted “Peanut butter jelly time.” Most of the performance itself felt very off and disorienting to me, as I could hardly hear what was going on with the din in the room and the obnoxious MC’s blubbering into the mic over us. People seemed entertained, though, so they must have been able to hear and see what we are doing. The fact that I was getting over a hellish cold with a super high fever (I had blacked out the previous day on the subway) really didn’t help. I think we were all a bit worn out and confused afterward, and we quickly gathered our stuff and disbanded. Collin and I came home and passed out in the wee hours of Christmas Eve morn to regain strength for the next day’s travels.

A few days later, Max emailed me and told me that we’d gotten a mention in Artforum (online) for it, and that really brightened my memory of the experience. I felt surprised and confused that the author had known our names but not mentioned those of our cohorts until I actually looked at who the author was and realized I knew him. Jen found a flickr set of the event by Gabi Porter, some of which are posted below (and above). Enjoy!

Jennifer Sullivan

Andrew Steinmetz

Jude Broughan and Erika Somogyi

Raven and Amber Ferguson and their mom

Dustin Piper

Sophia Peer

Jaimie Warren

New Video!

Behold my new video An Opportunity for Social Engagement, illustrating a chance meeting between Metalmags and the Alien Ambassador in an elevator aboard a spaceship. Featuring yours truly (Erica Magrey) and Collin Cunningham. See the embedded version below or HERE on youtube (remember to click on “watch in high quality.”)

For other videos with these characters see Alien Lounge Scene and Metalmags Performs on Chic-a-go-go!

Happy Inauguration Day!

Street vendor image posted on BoingBoing by Xeni Jardin.

Ya Gotta Love Weird Al

I watched UHF last night - it had been awhile - and was reminded that as stupid and corny as Weird Al’s humor is, it still cracks me up every time. There’s something about his particular style and charisma that elevates his flavor of comedy above other similarly stupid works like The Naked Gun. Then again, I seem to respond to super over-the-top corniness with a high cringe factor, so maybe it’s just his tilt toward risk-taking absurdity. After watching the movie, I revisited a Weird Al fave, White and Nerdy, and watched the entire nearly eleven minutes of the Trapped in the Closet parody titled Trapped in the Drive Thru. How did I not know that this existed?? I would have embedded the videos here but unfortch Weird Al TV won’t let me embed their vids. What’s up with that?

UHF - Stanley’s Rescue