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Superior Concept Monsters
Processional Arts Workshop (PAW) is an ensemble of performing artists and theatrical technicians founded in 1998, devoted to pageant puppetry and processional art. They are also known by the name Superior Concept Monsters (SCM). They are best known for creating the large-scale puppet performances that lead New York's Village Halloween Parade. History Founded by NY Halloween Parade designers Alex Kahn and Sophia Michahelles in 1998, SCM creates large-scale site-specific performance works specifically for the medium of procession, involving giant puppets, mobile scenography, shadow and projection, and other visual elements. These works often involve hundreds of volunteers who build and rehearse in community workshops, and then perform in the final event. Beyond their work for the Halloween Parade, PAW has travelled to communities around the world to create site-specific processions and parades based on local themes. Drawing on regional cultures, oral history, and current sociopolitic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
New York's Village Halloween Parade
The Village Halloween Parade is an annual holiday parade on the night of every Halloween, in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of New York City. The parade, initiated in 1974 by Greenwich Village puppeteer and mask maker Ralph Lee, is the world's largest Halloween parade and the only major nighttime parade in the United States. The parade reports itself to have 50,000 "costumed participants" and 2 million spectators. The parade has its roots in New York's queer community. The Village Halloween Parade has been called "New York's Carnival." The parade is largely a spontaneous event as individual marchers can just show up in costume at the starting point without registering or paying anything. The parade's signature features include its large puppets, which are animated by hundreds of volunteers. The official parade theme each year is applied to the puppets. In addition to the puppets, more than 50 marching bands participate each year. In addition, there are some commercial Hallo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alex Kahn
Alex Kahn is an American visual/performance artist and co-founder of the arts ensemble Processional Arts Workshop. He is most widely known for his creation of the large-scale puppet performance works that lead New York's Village Halloween Parade each year. Pageant puppetry and processional art In 1998, Kahn and his partner, Sophia Michahelles, brought together an ensemble of artists, puppeteers, theatrical technicians, and performers to design the annual performances that lead New York's Village Halloween Parade. Originally named "Superior Concept Monsters", the group was incorporated as a non-profit in 2005 and renamed Processional Arts Workshop with a mission to create site-specific community-built processions, parades, and other open-space performances. These works are often developed through open community workshops that bring hundreds of volunteers together to build, rehearse, and ultimately perform cyclical pieces specifically for the parade. The performances typically in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sophia Michahelles
Sophia Michahelles (born c. 1975) is one of the two chief artists and puppeteers of Processional Arts Workshop, makers of pageant puppets and other processional art in upstate New York. She works closely with co-director Alex Kahn. The couple's work, under the informal moniker "Superior Concept Monsters" has been commissioned each year since 1998 to lead New York's Village Halloween Parade, the largest puppet parade and street-pageant of its kind in the United States, drawing two million spectators. Many of the giant rod puppets (or "pageant" puppets) created by Michahelles and Kahn, are lit from the inside, making them suitable for night parades. They are performed by teams of puppeteers. For the 1998 Halloween parade, Michahelles worked with Kahn and his team to build five 20-foot caterpillar puppets (designed by Kahn) which transformed into giant Luna moths. In 2001, as a response to the attack on the World Trade Center, Michahelles herself designed an incandescent baby phoeni ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Socrates Sculpture Park
Socrates Sculpture Park is an outdoor museum and public park where artists can create and exhibit sculptures and multi-media installations. It is located one block from the Noguchi Museum at the intersection of Broadway and Vernon Boulevard in the neighborhood of Astoria, Queens, New York City. In addition to exhibition space, the park offers an arts education program, artist residency program, and job training. History and description Socrates Sculpture Park is located atop the mouth of the buried Sunswick Creek. In 1986, American sculptor Mark di Suvero created Socrates Sculpture Park on an abandoned landfill and illegal dumpsite in Long Island City. The four-acre site is the largest outdoor space in New York City dedicated to exhibiting sculpture. The former landfill was renovated into the current park by a team of contemporary artists and local youths. The park operated for 14 years with only a temporary city park status. In 1998, the park was given official status by then N ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
PEN World Voices
The PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature is an annual week-long literary festival held in New York City and Los Angeles. The festival was founded by Salman Rushdie, Esther Allen, and Michael Roberts and was launched in 2005. The festival includes events, readings, conversations, and debates that showcase international literature and new writers. The festival is produced by PEN America, a nonprofit organization that works to advance literature, promote free expression, and foster international literary fellowship. World Voices 2005 The inaugural event was held in New York City from April 18 to April 25, 2005. Participating authors came from 45 different countries and included: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Jonathan Ames, Paul Auster, Breyten Breytenbach, Nuruddin Farah, Gish Jen, Ryszard Kapuściński, Khaled Mattawa, Azar Nafisi, Elif Shafak, Wole Soyinka, Ali Bader and Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o. Selected 2005 Programs * Conversation: Chico Buarque and Paul Auster * Conf ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
High Line
The High Line is a elevated park, elevated linear park, greenway (landscape), greenway and rail trail created on a former New York Central Railroad spur on the West Side (Manhattan), west side of Manhattan in New York City. The High Line's design is a collaboration between James Corner, James Corner Field Operations, Diller Scofidio + Renfro, and Piet Oudolf. The abandoned spur has been redesigned as a "living system" drawing from multiple disciplines which include landscape architecture, urban design, and ecology. The High Line was inspired by the long Promenade plantée (tree-lined walkway), a similar project in Paris completed in 1993. The park is built on a disused, southern elevated railway, viaduct section of the New York Central Railroad's West Side Line. Originating in the Meatpacking District, Manhattan, Meatpacking District, the park runs from Gansevoort Street – three blocks below 14th Street (Manhattan), 14th Street – through Chelsea, Manhattan, Chelsea to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Phoenix (mythology)
The phoenix is an immortal bird associated with Greek mythology (with analogs in many cultures) that cyclically regenerates or is otherwise born again. Associated with the sun, a phoenix obtains new life by rising from the ashes of its predecessor. Some legends say it dies in a show of flames and combustion, others that it simply dies and decomposes before being born again. In the ''Motif-Index of Folk-Literature'', a tool used by folklore studies, folklorists, the phoenix is classified as motif B32.Thompson. (2001: 581). The origin of the phoenix has been attributed to Ancient Egypt by Herodotus and later 19th-century scholars, but other scholars think the Egyptian texts may have been influenced by classical folklore. Over time the phoenix motif spread and gained a variety of new associations; Herodotus, Lucan, Pliny the Elder, Pope Clement I, Lactantius, Ovid, and Isidore of Seville are among those who have contributed to the retelling and transmission of the phoenix motif. Ov ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
9/11
The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners scheduled to travel from the Northeastern United States to California. The hijackers crashed the first two planes into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, and the third plane into the Pentagon (the headquarters of the United States military) in Arlington County, Virginia. The fourth plane was intended to hit a federal government building in Washington, D.C., but crashed in a field following a passenger revolt. The attacks killed nearly 3,000 people and instigated the war on terror. The first impact was that of American Airlines Flight 11. It was crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center complex in Lower Manhattan at 8:46 a.m. Seventeen minutes later, at 9:03, the World Trade Center’s Sout ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Trinidad And Tobago
Trinidad and Tobago (, ), officially the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, is the southernmost island country in the Caribbean. Consisting of the main islands Trinidad and Tobago, and numerous much smaller islands, it is situated south of Grenada and off the coast of northeastern Venezuela. It shares maritime boundaries with Barbados to the northeast, Grenada to the northwest and Venezuela to the south and west. Trinidad and Tobago is generally considered to be part of the West Indies. The island country's capital is Port of Spain, while its largest and most populous city is San Fernando. The island of Trinidad was inhabited for centuries by Indigenous peoples before becoming a colony in the Spanish Empire, following the arrival of Christopher Columbus, in 1498. Spanish governor José María Chacón surrendered the island to a British fleet under the command of Sir Ralph Abercromby in 1797. Trinidad and Tobago were ceded to Britain in 1802 under the Treaty of Amiens as se ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Performance Artist Collectives
A performance is an act of staging or presenting a play, concert, or other form of entertainment. It is also defined as the action or process of carrying out or accomplishing an action, task, or function. Management science In the work place, job performance is the hypothesized conception or requirements of a role. There are two types of job performances: contextual and task. Task performance is dependent on cognitive ability, while contextual performance is dependent on personality. Task performance relates to behavioral roles that are recognized in job descriptions and remuneration systems. They are directly related to organizational performance, whereas contextual performances are value-based and add additional behavioral roles that are not recognized in job descriptions and covered by compensation; these are extra roles that are indirectly related to organizational performance. Citizenship performance, like contextual performance, relates to a set of individual activity/co ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
