More Information About 4x4: Latino New Works

Website

http://www.highwaysperformance.org

Description

Edge It Out: Transgressive Ritual, Fragmented Identity, and Taboo
Building on the tradition of socially progressive alternative performance, these emerging Latina/o artists present new, individually original works.

Friday, September 17 @ 8.30pm
Claudia Rodriguez exorcises her sick and twisted fantasies on stage in Abandon: Hit Me Back to Heaven. Performed in collaboration with Anna P. Sutton (aka Mistress Anna), Abandon focuses on how Rodriguez’s sexual/spiritual energy is drawn out through BDSM rituals to achieve a psycho-spiritual state once achieved through her now abandoned Catholic roots.

In addition, Claudia Huiza’s La Nedda C. (created in collaboration with Brenda Mezquita) uses latex to deal with rebirth, the survival of youth and identity politics.

Saturday, September 18 @ 8:30pm
Sounds of ASTEROTH unleashes the original outer space rock Opera, Into The Fluorescence - the story of an obsessed female fanatic who will stop at nothing to get the attention of the alien musician known simply as Captain Martini. Replete with perfectly crafted songs and mind-blowing costumes that literally light up, “Into The Fluorescence” is an original one time only experience that comes to this planet less often than Haley’s Comet.

Sounds of ASTEROTH’s Into The Fluorescence was created by its star and lead singer Martin Matamoros (Martin Von Sexxxy), who not only wrote, directed, choreographed and set designed the show but also made all the costumes out of everyday materials such as cereal boxes, tissue paper, pipe cleaners, and even candy!

In the gallery (Friday + Saturday)
Performance installation by:
Rafael Esparza

Rafael Esparza, a first generation queer Xikano, presents two new performance installations in his series Tezkatlipoka Memoirs. Dreams: Sunchaser, which investigates pre-Columbian sculptures as documents of a performed esoteric knowledge. Performing the sculpture through investigating it's form specifically, Esparza questions the memory of the object at hand while dislocating, distorting and/or appropriating meaning(s) that come forth prior, during, or after the performance. Endurance, constraints, limits, pain, and release are all functional elements that help him and the viewers attempt to rediscover his body as an object and the meanings thus attached.

About the Ticket Supplier: Highways Performance Space

Highways Performance Space is Southern California's boldest center for new performance. Founded in 1989, Highways continues to be an important alternative cultural center in Los Angeles that encourages fierce new artists from diverse communities to develop and present innovative works.

Highways promotes the development of contemporary socially involved artists and art forms. Our mission is implemented through four programs (the performance space, workshop/university program and two galleries). Annually, Highways co-presents approximately 250 performances by solo dramatic artists, small theater groups, dance companies and spoken word artists; curates and exhibits approximately 12 contemporary visual art exhibits per year with work that explores the boundaries between performing and visual art forms; commissions and premieres new work by outstanding performing artists; organize special events, curate festival, offer residency and educational programs that engage community members in the arts while providing access to professionally-directed instruction.