Art Theory: A Deep Rabbit Hole
in The Wilderness Garden
a one act play
Performed at Hay Barn Theatre, Goddard College, Plainfield, VT
July 29, 2006
The Greek thauma [...] is the source of both theory and theatre; both speculation
and spectacle, seeing with the mind and seeing with the eye. (1)
Tom Cheetham
video stills: Elizabeth Yng-Wong, missYng pictures, The Wilderness Garden
Evening of July 29, Hay Barn Theatre, Goddard
College, VT. Samara Talkin in foreground preparing for her role as
"Aside". In background, Carolyne Landon, writer, director, performer,
discusses opening scene with Casey Groves, performing as the "Green Man"
and "Coyote".
Opening scene: far left, seated, Lisa Wolpe
performing the role of "Cee", standing, left, Carolyne Landon
performing the role of the silent witness "Hildegard von Bingen",
standing, right, Casey Groves as the "Green Man". Masked characters of
"Hildegard von Bingen" and "Green Man" are "Irrational Mystical
Entities".
Left, Lisa Wolpe as "Cee", right, Casey Groves as "Coyote".
Left, Madoc Yng-Wong performing as "Baby Bird", right, Lisa Wolpe as "Cee".
Audience performing in the "Chorus of Scholarly
Quotes". Left to right, Karin Bolender (reading "Henry Corbin"), Donna Catanzaro
(reading "Master Printer"), Meg McHutchison (reading "Poet").
Musicians, left
to right, Avelynn Mitra (piano), Karl Warma (harmonica), David Berggren
(guitar). Not seen, Ed Dalpe (recorded digital composition).
Debbie McClintock
seated on the floor, as "Bead Counter"an "Irrational Mystical Entity". In foreground Monta May and
Jennifer Berringer perform as rope/string dancers, also among the "Irrational
Mystical Entities"
"Wampum" beads glowing in the dark at end of performance.
Abstract
In the magical reality of Art Theory: A deep rabbit hole in The Wilderness Garden,
Cee finds herself in a rabbit warren with the trickster, Coyote, who is
chasing a rabbit. During the chase Coyote discovers Donald
Kuspit’s The End of Art.
Riding on the back of Coyote, Cee reads and thinks aloud about
Kuspit’s critique of the “New Old Masters”. She
likens the search for her identity as an easel painter in current art
theory to the search of Baby Bird for his mother in P. D.
Eastman’s children’s book Are You My Mother? Kuspit’s
discussion of a group of artists who excavate the Old Masters for
inspiration excites Cee into thinking that she has found her
“mother” in The New Old Masters but then realizes that the
handle “The New Old Masters” is not her mother. She finds
her mother in Beauty. In the rabbit hole of art theory Cee ponders the
fate of the postmodern “basso-relievo” artist’s
anti-aesthetic and fragmented vision and wonders if it is
the curse of the gods described by Aristophanes in Plato’s
Symposium for those who do not pursue the wholeness of love.
Green Man (Mask)
St. Hildegard von Bingen (Mask)
"Wampum" Bead Counter
String Knot Tier(s)
Video Camera
Musicians
Props
Chairs for each performer/reader set in a circle.
Action
Audience is invited to participate in performance by reading voices in the "Chorus of Scholarly Quotes".
Performance opens with Hildergard von Bingen and Green Man masked
performers moving silently around the circle of performers/audience,
meeting where they began and with their backs to circle,
they exchange masks and circle in opposite direction. Once they have
completed second round of silent movement, "Narrator" begins to read.
Remaining on the outside of the circle, masked performers continue to
move in silence through out performance.
"Mumbling Endnotes" will sit inside the circle.
"Aside" will
walk at will through and around the circle as will "Video Camera".
"Bead Counter" will sit in circle slowly counting/reading "wampum"
beads and coiling them in a spiral on the floor. At the end of the
performance the lights will be lowered until the florescent beads glow
in the dark creating the constellation of Cee's life.
"Rope Dancers" move within the circle working with a length of
rope that is tied together at its ends. The changing shape of the rope symbolizes the subtext of the play – Bahaba's
statement: "the difference of the same" and Coomaraswamy's "not
related, but the same."
Musicians improvise through out performance.
Images of Cee's work will be projected during performance.
(1) Tom Cheetham, Green Man Earth Angel: The Prophetic Tradition and the Battle for the Soul of the World, (Albany, State University of New York Press, 2005) 82
Full quote:
The Greek thauma means "a wonder, a thing compelling to the gaze. (66) " The gaze that is turned upon this wonder is the theoria, an inward-turning contemplation of the theophanic apparition. We [...]
are in the interworld where thought and thing mingle. It is the meeting
place of the two seas, of the divine and the earthly, where Moses meets
Khidr. The dokeo unites thought and being by bringing together appearance, thought, and belief. Likewise, thauma is the source of both theory and theater: both speculation and spectacle, seeing with the mind and seeing with the eye."
(66) Partridge, Origins: A short Dictionary of English Etymology, s.v. theater. Cheetham, 126
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