There's Something About Jane

Visual Artist Jessica Ann Peavy at Rush Arts Gallery

Floating between video vixen and video maverick, Jessica Ann Peavy produces imagined worlds where black women come face to face with self, story-telling and stereotypes.

The intersection of Peavy's backgrounds in film and photography have resulted in an unparalleled visual language that blends color, shapes, lines and textures together in a manner that is beautiful and assertive. Against fantastic backdrops of muted hues and softened edges, frozen facial expressions and momentous gesticulations assume the sacred dialogues that decorate the experience of urban black women from youth to adulthood. Peavy is at the helm of the new wave of young black women artists. Her stills and video pieces have already constructed a powerful space where black women perceive and represent themselves not as victims of history's twisted fate, but as authorities of their own past, present and future experiences. Peavy completed her B.F.A. in photography at Tisch at New York University and M.F.A. at the School of Visual Arts.

www.jessicaannpeavy.com



© T.I. Williams

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NY Spotlight: Alexa Birdsong

SummerStage is a monster this year. Meet the mastermind behind it…

Alexa Birdsong began her career organizing jazz and blues concerts and festivals for George Wein's noted company, Festival Productions, Inc. more than twenty years ago and has continued to produce major national and international festivals since.

From cultural powerhouse Lincoln Center to the phenomenal CityParks Foundation, she has brought amazing programming to diverse audiences nationally and internationally. And if being the Executive Producer of Central Park SummerStage and CityParks Concerts wasn't enough, Alexa also runs Birdsong Productions whose client list is filled with big names like the ESSENCE Music Festival, New Orleans, LA and Grammy Award winning jazz vocalist Cassandra Wilson.

Recently, Birdsong gave Streets of New York her take on SummerStage and the city.

When did you become an official New Yorker:

I was bornand raised in New York City, first in Harlem, then Queens. Now, I'm back in Harlem in loving it!

How does New York culture influence your SummerStage selections:

SummerStage is a reflection of the diversity of the city, so, in a way New York City's culture influences SummerStage and my programming.

What was your most memorable SummerStage performance:

They are all memorable for me, but the standout was Grace Jones on Gay Pride Day in 2002, with Bjork peeking at her from backstage.

Who would perform at the ultimate SummerStage concert:

Carlos Santana, Miles Davis (though he's no longer with us). Blondie, Lauryn Hill, La Sonora Poncera, Terrence Trent Darby...everyone is wonderful at SummerStage...

Top Picks:

Favorite annual concert series… SummerStage

Emerging artists picks in music, visual arts and theater… Laura Veirs, Feist, Davell Crawford

Gallery/exhibition pick of the moment… Richard Serra at MOMA. I used to live on campus at Princeton and walked through his sculptures everyday

Tip for mastering the NY grind… Don't go out on Friday nights!

NY as a source of artist inspiration… Skyscrapers

What's in your music player… Lewis Taylor, Roberta Flack

Street culture inspiration of the moment… Graffiti

www.summerstage.org

© T.I. Williams

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And Then There Was Peaches: Progress Theatre's Riveting Production

As a play, Peaches left little to the imagination in the way of the emotionally ravishing experience of slavery. With quick wit and easy language, Progress Theatre expressed plantation life for a modern society steeped in the seeming benefits of contemporary capitalist America.

Without missing a beat, Peaches fuses gospel, field songs and pure attitude. The audience is introduced to the character Peaches as a young woman in a blossoming love affair with a fellow slave under the sordid conditions of a southern plantation. For youthful Peaches, her plantation love Thad Guntharpe is a lifeline to her future and a physical manifestation of her dreams. Before the audience's eyes, the bashful girl morphs into a complex woman with a full range of emotions. And just as viewers settled into the nuances of life for a black slave woman on the plantation, a deep cry sounds from the cavernous backs and strong bellys of the cast, thrusting us forward to a different era, different music and a different Peaches.

As a play, Peaches left little to the imagination in the way of the emotionally ravishing experience of slavery. With quick wit and easy language, Progress Theatre expressed plantation life for a modern society steeped in the seeming benefits of contemporary capitalist America.

Peaches struggles with the guilt of the blues and the conviction of Christianity in voices that Baptists, 7-Day Adventists and Pentecostals all know. Throughout the religious era of Peaches' life, the actors had the audience swaying in perfect time just the way folk do in rickety, worn wooden pews as their jolting movements came together in a vivid rainbow dream.

Playwright and Director, Cristal Truscott played Peaches so perfectly and the part was so expertly crafted, it is hard to imagine another pulling such a byzantine character by the horns and displaying such plebian deftness all while singing out in voices scratch that like Mary and rattle like Patti.

Peaches possess the familiarity of Caribbean roots theater and the refinement of Broadway; and can attract audiences outfitted in door-knocker earrings and Air Max™ sneakers as well as mink stoles and Italian leather pumps. It is rare to experience theater that cross that many bridges and set so many precedents!

Undoubtedly, the cast delivered an absolutely electrifying message in a charged performance. The play was thoroughly unique and honestly prototypical in its uncanny fusion of song, dance, historical acumen and successful translation of the black female psychological experience in America.

http://www.progresstheatre.com/

© T.I. Williams

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