Letters From Earth
2021
Portland Art Museum · Venice VR Expanded (offsite, Venice Biennale)
Portland, OR and virtual
Three-channel projection-mapped installation / Performance collaboration
Letters from Earth surrounded visitors at Venice VR Expanded 2021 (hosted at the Portland Art Museum) with an immersive three-channel projection-mapped environment, asking: What devotions does the Earth ask of us as its most powerful inhabitants? Conceived and directed by Fernanda D’Agostino, the project sought to re-enchant the world through embodied offerings collected from a global network of correspondents.
Performers were invited to create gestures, movements, and rituals as letters to the Earth. Among the Portland-based contributors were fellow In/Body collaborator Jaleesa Johnston and myself, whose embodied offerings were recorded live as part of the project’s local anchor. Our work, together with contributions from Mexico City, Tokyo, Riyadh, Italy, and across the U.S., was woven through creative coding and projection mapping into dreamlike transmissions that transformed the museum ballroom into a shifting vision of the Earth’s miracle and fragility.
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Concept, creative direction, creative coding: Fernanda D’Agostino
Performers / Correspondents:
Yunuen Rhi and Claudia Franco (Mexico); Juju and Lisa Kusanagi (Tokyo, Japan); Sahra Brahim (Riyadh, Saudi Arabia); Marcello Natarelli (Italy); Sophia Wright Emigh and Jaleesa Johnston (Portland, OR); Chan Moly Sam (Cambodian Community of White Center, WA); Mariko Ohno (Kabuki Theater of Tacoma, WA); Judy Chan (Chinese Opera R & D Association, Tacoma, WA); Justin Charles Hoover (Chinese Historical Society of America); Sarah Turner (Portland, OR)
Liminal Performance Space contributors: Sophia Wright Emigh, Lisa and Juju Kusanagi, Yunuen Rhi
Presented at: Portland Art Museum, offsite project for Venice Biennale New Media Island (Venice VR Expanded, 2021)
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Tags: Installation, Film, Performance, Multi-channel film installation, Interdisciplinary research, Collaboration, Ritual / Ceremonial practice, Embodied research, Art & science initiative, International project
