A dancer prepares to descend onto the facade of the Anchorage Museum. The event on Sept. 21 marks the Fall Equinox, when Earth and the Sun briefly face each other, before we northerners tilt off into our winter night. Performed and presented by The Light Brigade. (Photo by Michael Conti, used with permission from The Light Brigade)
Their art house is wherever they are—a pocket park, under the Ship Creek Bridge, inside an old power utility.
Or, on the Fall Equinox of Sept. 21, upon the glimmering facade of the Anchorage Museum, with aerial dancers.
But who are they, and what are they saying?
That’s the topic of the next Hometown Alaska, when The Light Brigade’s Bruce Farnsworth, the Anchorage Museum’s interim director and curator Julie Decker, and urbanist Bree Kessler join host Kathleen McCoy to set the stage for Sept. 21. This event is called “Over, Beyond, Across, Through” and it is The Light Brigade’s final site-specific piece for 2013.
In their own words:
Anchorage Museum facade with dancers preparing for their Sept. 21 performance celebrating the Fall Equinox.(Photo by Michael Conti, used with permission from The Light Brigade)
We plan, design and execute creative time-based, site specific interventions on the local landscape and built environment using the full assortment of tools our consortium members possess: dance, lighting, illusion, visual and sonic media, augmented reality, poetry.
The Light Brigade’s work is in the hacker tradition, interrupting the normal flow of events, subverting expectations, disrupting thought-patterns-as-usual. But unlike our brothers and sisters in the digital world, our interventions take place in real time and in three-dimensional space.
The Light Brigade does not permanently inhabit, occupy or create physical space. Rather, we honor nature, community and the human spirit by bringing art to new audiences, activating public and natural spaces, and inspiring people to re-imagine what “place” is and how they relate to and understand it.
This event is a part of the museum’s Northern Initiative, drawing Northern dwellers together to examine Arctic challenges and opportunities. Or, put more simply, how to make life better for all of us.
No surprise these two arts entities have found common ground.
