Malcolm-x Betts. Photo by Stephen Olweck.
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For this Open Studios, Malcolm-x Betts assembles artists that are reaching through and toward something very specific in their practice, and which inspire his own work. With interest in archiving and distribution, Betts frames this Open Studios as a portal into process, and a decentralized presentation of the undone.
Bryanna Bradley will get rigorous and conjure something on the move; Jordan Deal will show an excerpt of their work-in-progress piece MOMMA i RODE THE BEAST! through the sun of fawnings/dust devil/waterspout, a transportation into the indulgences of undercurrents, dark matter, and worlds that bubble through the cracks of streets, swamps, and seas that shape our social and political landscapes and store themselves in the BODY; BriFreí will show an ongoing work in progress titled “Inntertainment Purposes Only” featuring experimental original sounds; and Nazareth Hassan will share a collaboration with Sierra D. Leverett, 2 eleven 2, which brings choreography, music-making, and text together through children's hand games and song.
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Open Studios is a series of work-in-progress showings held regularly throughout the year, organized by guest curators, and serves as an incubator for new work, inviting the public into the artistic process.
Biographies
Bryanna Bradley is a conceptual artist whose medium is the body in rigorous live performance. Devised theater, improvisational dance, and intentional ritual are used in their practice to explore tons of thoughts, theories, and intellectual hunches. Bryanna is the Creatrix of Gastrointestinal Epigenetic Somatic Theory (G.E.S.T- pronounced like gesture), a field of study concerning ways ancestral information trauma, healing modalities, and physical dis-ease can travel through one’s genetic code and be expressed through that individual’s digestive system, more specifically, the gastrointestinal (GI) tract. G.E.S.T unpacks/articulates the intersection of digestion, ancestry, and travel. Bryanna is no stranger to cross-disciplinary collaborations; they were a lead performer of MacArthur Genius Award winner Tavares Strachan's exhibition The Awakening at the New York Marian Goodman Gallery, performed their own work buck: an exploration of black masculinity in Nick Cave's exhibition Until at MASS MoCA, and collaborated with former Boston Poet Laureate Danielle Legros Georges on a performance of her poem Intersection. Other beautiful collaborations are her work with the after-image (HOUSE OF AMERICAN ACTIVITES, Let's Exorcize! A Community Catharty Party) and Eastline Theater (In the Next Room). Bryanna loves to think big and sweat hard.
Jordan Deal (aka ROSEKILLJUPITER) is a Philadelphia-based multidisciplinary practitioner and alchemist. Their investigative practice uses performance, sound, and image as a conduit between unseen forces and the materializations of socio-political structures. They have been investigating the use of storytelling and gathering as the accumulation of urban mythbuilding, mapping, memory, and the use of vocal and movement based improvisation as a generative and investigative tool that harnesses and disperses CHAOS as a subversive material. Through the use of collected sound field recordings, video/film documenta, and real-time autobiographical myth fabrication, Deal explores dialectics, borders and territories; blackness as creative destruction; historical artifacts; the tropes of superhero/villain; undead knowledge; and counter-active channels of potentiality that exists against global colonialism and imperialism’s frameworks and mappings. Deal has shown work with Protocinema & Protodispatch (2022 & 2023), Fleisher-Ollman gallery (PHL), Brick Theater (NYC), Vox Populi (PHL), Fleisher Art Memorial (PHL), Grizzly Grizzly (PHL), Bartram’s Gardens (PHL), and No Tomorrow Underground (ATL), amongst others. Last year, Deal was selected as a Fall 2022 Research Fellow at Amant Foundation in Brooklyn, where they continued their investigations of chaos force. They have been included in press such as the ARTNews, ArtBlog, Titled House Review: Spring 2021 Issue and Grizzly Grizzly: In Dialogue.
Bronx native BriFreí is a creator driven by spiritual expansion. Using their performance art practice as a means to maintain physical, spiritual, and mental health, BriFrei’s whimsical & tragic acts take the witness on a wild yet healing trip.
Nazareth Hassan is a writer, director, and musician. Recent works include Memory A at Museo Universitario del Arte Contemporaneo in Mexico City, Untitled (1-5) at The Shed, and VANTABLACK at Theatretreffen Stueckemarkt in Berlin. Recent collaborations include Malcolm-X Betts, z tye, Nile Harris, Alex Romania, nicHi douglas, Clifford Prince King, and Mariyea. Hassan was the resident dramaturg at the Royal Court Theatre in 2022, and is a 2023 Jerome Artist Fellow.
Sierra D. Leverett is an actress, singer, and artist from Phoenix, AZ who is living her passions in Brooklyn. Her latest works have graced the stages of The Shed (Untitled 1-5), Soho Rep (A Map to Nowhere (things are)), and JACK (TJ Loves Sally 4 Ever, a 2020 New York Times Critic’s Pick). She deeply enjoys engaging in shows, workshops, and challenging processes across the city that engage her Blackness, queerness, ever morphing understanding of Self and the forces that may move around and within her.
Malcolm-x Betts (curator) is a New York-based visual and dance artist who believes that art is a transformative vehicle that brings people and communities together. His artistic work is rooted in investigating embodiment for liberation, Black imagination, and directly engaging with challenges placed on the physical body. He has a community engagement practice allowing artistic freedom and making art accessible to everyone, and has recently worked with undocumented immigrants on Bronx Speaks: Dreamers with the Bronx Museum. Betts developed and presented work at La MaMa Umbria International (Spoleto, Italy), La MaMa ETC, Gibney Dance Center, Movement Research at Judson Church, Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), The Bronx Museum, and Dixon Place. Betts has shown excerpts of Midnight Glow: Kinfolk at Brooklyn Arts Exchange (BAX), Movement Research at Judson Church, and Draftworks at Danspace Project. Kinfolk Vol 2: Butch Queen was presented by Judson Arts in November 2021. Betts has performed in works by luciana achugar, Jonathan González, Snoggybox, Nile Harris, and Alex Romania, and was a 2018 Movement Research Artist-in-Residence.