The first program dedicated to the discussion and exploration of various themes in Performance Art, TALKaCTIVE, begins season series with the presentations of “Performance and Associations.” This month conversation focuses on aspects of associative creation, relational experiences, collaborative undertakings, and exploration of communal performative actions. Featured artists work, reference, investigate, and explore modalities of connection with and among peers and with the public. The presentation of documentation of works will be followed by a panel conversation and Q&A with attending audience.
Participating Artists: Beatriz Albuquerque (Portugal), Hoesy Corona (Mexico), Jenna Kline (United States), and Verónica Peña (Spain).

Moderated by curator: Hector Canonge.

About the Artists:

BEATRIZ ALBUQUERQUE is an interdisciplinary Portuguese artist living in New York City. She is known for her work landing from performance art, cross media, and photography. Awards include the Breakthrough Award for the 17th Biennial Cerveira; Myers Art Prize Award from Columbia University, New York; and the Ambient Performance Series Award, PAC / edge Performance Festival, Chicago.  Albuquerque exhibits internationally, with solo and group exhibitions at the Museum of Contemporary Art of Chicago; Chicago Cultural Center; Chelsea Art Museum, New York; Emily Harvey Foundation, New York; Anthology Film Archives, New York; Brazilian Endowment for the Arts, New York; 10th International Istanbul Biennial, Turkey; 2nd Thessaloniki Biennale of Contemporary Art, Greece; MUBE Brazilian Museum of Sculpture, Sao Paulo, Brazil; Ghana National Museum; Museo de Arte Contemporanea de Bogota, Columbia; Museo de Arte Contemporanea de Caracas, Venezuela; TRAMA Festival in Porto, Portugal; among others.

HOESY CORONA is a multidisciplinary artist and the founding co-director of Labbodies, a performance art laboratory in Baltimore, Maryland, that creates opportunities for performance artists to exhibit their work. He is Hoesy Corona and he is also Dr. H. Corona. His alter egos are part of his larger inquiry into who we are and how we construct ourselves and our identities. And how so often those who exist on the margins of society have to change who they are simply to survive. The driving inquiry that runs throughout all of his work is: what does it mean to be a queer latinx in a place where there are few queer latinxs and what are the social and psychological ramifications of not seeing yourself reflected anywhere. Corona’s unapologetically colorful, sculptural and performance based works have appeared at The Baltimore Museum of Art, The Walters Art Museum, Visarts, Transformer DC, Glass House Project, Kern Gallery, Haggerty Museum, and The Brooklyn International Performance Art Festival among others. Corona is the recipient of a 2016 Ruby’s Artist Grant in Visual Arts, a 2013 MSAC Individual Artist Award, and a 2015 Force:Upsetting Rape Culture Pelham Printmaking Residency. He has been awarded a Light City 2017 commission, a Winter 2016 Neighborhood Lights Artist in Residence in Baltimore’s Station North, a Spring 2016 Cafe Con Leche Latino Artist Residency in Pittsburgh, PA, and is a current CHM Sculpture Park Fellow in Baltimore, MD. He was named an Artist to Watch by Baltimore Magazine in 2015, best Mad Scientist by Citypaper  and included in the arts issue of Baltimore Style in 2016.

JENNA KLINE’s most important tool is her body.  Nightmares, memories and heartbreak fuel her work.  Her body is a sculpture, storyteller, and most importantly, an instrument to connect with her audience.  The performances create an expression of raw emotion via cathartic delirium. She enters adorned with a full face of makeup including bright red lipstick, high heels and lacy bras to achieve a hyper- feminine persona.  As she performs, the lipstick smears and the delicate undergarments collect the dirt from the floor.  Viscera – including cow hearts, pig intestines, kidneys and slabs of sirloin steak are strapped to the body and face with zip ties.  What began as a dance recital has become a grotesque, uncoordinated display. She imposes impossible tasks and challenges to overcome and a struggle ensues. Singing songs beyond her ability with a steak over her mouth and eyes and dancing spastically for long periods of time with her legs bound together.  Eventually she reaches her physical and emotional limit and collapses.  The result is often slapstick in nature with a dark, gory undercurrent. The goal is to achieve emotional enlightenment.  Once she reaches this state, she becomes her most genuine, transparent and true self – wearing her heart on her sleeve for all to see.  Exhausted, sweating and panting – she has transcended her physical body and has reached an elevated level of awareness.

VERONICA PEÑA is an interdisciplinary artist from Spain based in the United States. Her work explores the themes of absence, separation, and the search for harmony through performance art. Peña is interested in migration policies, cross-cultural dialogue, and women’s empowerment. Recent works include experimental participatory performances that create shared moments amongst strangers. Peña has performed in various countries around Europe, Asia, and America. Her work has been featured at NYU’s Hemispheric Institute, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Queens Museum, Grace Exhibition Space, Times Square, Armory Show, and DUMBO Arts Festival, amongst others. In Spain, her work has been exhibited at Casa de America (Madrid), Fundacion Antonio Saura (Cuenca), Museo Orus (Zaragoza), and Fundacion Caja Rioja (La Rioja), amongst others. She was a recipient of the Socrates and Erasmus Grants, a Universidad Complutense de Madrid Fellowship, and a candidate for the Dedalus Foundation Grant. She was an Artist-in-Residence at Vermont Studio Center, United States. She has published “The Presence Of The Absent”, a thesis about her body of work. She has been a visiting artist at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She curates “Collective Becoming”, an initiative to make our cities a place less hostile. She is currently at work on her new project about freedom, fear, and resistance, “The Substance of Unity.”

About the Moderator
HECTOR CANONGE (creator and curator of TALKaCTIVE) is an interdisciplinary artist, curator, media educator and cultural entrepreneur based in New York City. His work incorporates the use of new media technologies, cinematic narratives, Live Action Art, and Social Practice to explore and treat issues related to constructions of identity, gender roles, psychogeography, and the politics of migration. He has exhibited and presented broadly in the United States, Latin America, Europe and Asia. As cultural entrepreneur, Canonge created and directs the annual festival ITINERANT, started the projects: ARTerial Performance Lab (APLAB), an initiative to foster collaboration among performance artists from the Americas, PERFORMEANDO, a program that focuses on featuring Hispanic performance artists living in the USA, NEXUSURNEXUS a virtual platform for Live Action Art, and PERFORMAXIS, an international residency program in collaboration with galleries and art spaces in Latin America. After living abroad for almost 3 years, Canonge returned to the USA in late 2015 to continue with his projects, exhibitions, and presentations: TALKaCTIVE, performance art series, CONVIVIR, international residency program at his new space, MODULO 715 in Jackson Heights, QUeens, and LiVEART.US. The artist is currently at work in his new project “LABoRAL,” funded by Frankin Furnace Award, to be presented on December 20, at Glasshouse Project in NYC.

About the Program
TALKaCTIVE: perfomance art conversation series- is a new program that fosters dialogue and exchange among Live Action Art practitioners, encourages commentary about Performance Art, and prompts reflection about performative processes, methodologies, and styles. Every session is organized around a relevant topic in Performance Art, and the presentation of works by a group of selected artists who share their work, discuss their approach to Live Art, and engage in open conversation with critics, curators, and attending audience. The monthly series consists of a presentation, panel, and open Q&A session where participating artists screen documentation of their work, a curator or critic contextualizes the works presented, and a moderator mediates the exchange of information and resources. TALKaCTIVE is an independent initiative created and organized by artist Hector Canonge. Hosted at the Queens Museum, the monthly series is free of charge and open to the general public.

Contact: TALKaCTIVE

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