Coming to the Redfern: Niicugni, The Rap Guide to Evolution
From Jackie Hooper, Redfern Arts Center:
The Redfern Arts Center at Keene State College and Vermont Performance Lab (VPL) are joining forces to present Niicugni – the latest performance work by Bessie-award winning Native Alaskan choreographer Emily Johnson and Catalyst Dance. Niicugni, the second in a trilogy of performance works related to Johnson’s Yup’ik heritage, investigates community, place, memory, and identity and will be performed on Wednesday, February 13 at 7:30 p.m. in the Main Theatre of the Redfern Arts Center. Tickets are $20 for adults; $13 for senior citizens, children, and KSC alumni, faculty and staff; and $5 for KSC students. Call the Redfern Box Office at 603-358-2168 or visit www.keene.edu/racbp.
For this performance Johnson is inviting 40 community members from New Hampshire and Vermont to participate in Niicugni. The Redfern and VPL have been recruiting farmers and gardeners, librarians and archivists, sewers, knitters, and beekeepers to participate in the performance of Niicugni at the Redfern Arts Center. People are invited to arrive early to view a lobby art exhibit and video showing community members making fish-skin lanterns and stay after the show for a discussion with Johnson and the other performers.
Two years ago Johnson began creating Niicugni at VPL in Guilford, Vt., where she developed movement and sound material, and worked with a group of local sewers to create 11 of the 50 hand-sewn salmon skin lanterns that light the work.
Niicugni is the Y’upik word for “listen” – a directive to pay attention. Through its layering of live music, dance and storytelling, Niicugni quietly compels the audience to take notice of place and history.
For more on Niicugni, Emily Johnson, and Vermont Performance Lab, see the full story on keene.edu’s news site.
Also from Jackie:
The Rap Guide to Evolution by Baba Brinkman uses hip-hop as a vehicle to communicate the facts of evolution while illuminating the origins of hip-hop culture with Darwin as inspiration. Brinkman brings his novel species of theatre to the Redfern Arts Center at Keene State College on Tuesday, February 5, at 7:30 p.m. The same day, a school performance for middle and high school students will take place at 9:30 a.m. Brinkman will stay after each show for a discussion with the audience.
While in residence, Brinkman will present a workshop on writing theatrical rap versifications on Monday, February 4, at 8 a.m. in the Wright Theatre with KSC theatre faculty Doug Wilcox’s Art of the Imagination theatre course. Additionally, students from the KSC Breakers, the Breaking and Hip-Hop Culture Club of Keene State College, will give a breakdancing demonstration in the Student Center Atrium on Tuesday, February 5 at noon. The demonstration is free and open to the general public.
Tickets are $20 for the general public; $13 for senior citizens, children, KSC alumni, faculty, and staff; $5 for Keene State students; and $10 for the school performance. Call the Redfern Box Office at 603-358-2168 or order online at www.keene.edu/racbp.
Canadian rap artist Baba Brinkman created The Rap Guide as a hip-hop exploration of modern biology that is provocative, hilarious, intelligent and scientifically accurate. Brinkman performs his clever reworking of popular rap singles as well as his own originals to illustrate natural selection and the evolutionary roots of human behavior. Brinkman undertook the project at the suggestion of geneticist Dr. Mark Pallen, who requested a rap version of On the Origin of Species for Charles Darwin’s 200th birthday in 2009. In order to ensure scientific and historical accuracy, he consulted Pallen throughout the creative process, making The Rap Guide to Evolution the first peer-reviewed hip-hop show.
For more on The Rap Guide and Baba Brinkman, see the full story on keene.edu’s news site.
