Imagination: Glue for Facts

For a recent family reunion (250 Forsters in San Juan Capistrano, CA!), I adapted the research on Ysidora Pico de Forster (1808-1873), which I collected during the creation of my performance “What’s on [My] Mind?“ and presented it to my family members in a straight-up presentation, complete with a Keynote  slide show. In …

What’s on [My] Mind? — Transmedia Performance

  On March 12, 2014, I premiere a major part of the performance project I’ve been working on for the past year — What’s on [My] Mind?  What’s on [My] Mind? is a transmedia performance. Working in multiple mediums — monologues, music, social media, virtual worlds, and blogs —I explore how …

Facilitating Alternate Identities

So there I was minding my own, royal, business, when that impertinent woman Ysidora Pico (who’s still bitter about losing her land [try losing your life]) says to me, Izzy, why don’t you stop writing unsigned love letters to your boyfriend Troilo Orsini who will have his butt on a …

Aphrodite in her Chain-mail Nightie (Reflection on “The Planets”)

Did come thrice with Mars… I didn’t actually end up dressing in a chain-mail nightie, but I would have liked to if I’d had more time! In the fourth quarter of 2013, Vanessa Blaylock asked me to participate in her Dance for Camera: The Planets, which would be staged in …

1850s Twitter Chat — Invitation to Participate

Let’s put an ancestor of ours from the year 1850 in conversation with one another in the present on Twitter. Why? To see what happens! In my current performance project — “What’s on [My] Mind?” — I use an intergenerational persona to transcend time, space, race, class and history in …