FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Jess Young, Director of Communications
& Community Engagement
415-863-1414 x112 • jess@somarts.org
SOMArts Cultural Center Presents
THE NEWS
Fresh queer performance by Bay Area artists, Tuesday, April 2, 2013, 7:30pm–9pm
San Francisco, CA, March 26, 2013— SOMArts Cultural Center presents The News, a monthly offering of new and experimental performance works on Tuesday, April 2, 2013, 7:30pm to 9pm. Held on the first Tuesday of each month, The News spotlights queer experiments, debut works, and works-in-progress by pre-selected solo artists, groups and troupes.
Bernadette Bohan of The Box Factory— an art, music and culture space in the Mission district of San Francisco— curates, performs and guest-hosts for The News in April. In celebration of the 5 year anniversary of The Box Factory, Bohan showcases long-time The Box Factory favorites Joe Conscious, Stephen Eagle Funk, Diego Gomez, Spencer Peterson, Rheal Tea and Yosefine Tinkelman (Opal Eye).
Bohan is the fourth of five hosting guest curators enlisted by the evening’s creator Kolmel WithLove to bring fresh performances and curatorial flare to The News in the coming months. Future hosting guest curators include Peter Max Lawrence with Philip Huang on Tuesday, June 4, 2013.
House opens at 7:00pm and space is limited. Admission is $5, and advance tickets may be purchased at thenewsperformance.eventbrite.com. An informal session for artist-led feedback and resource sharing follows the performances.
Calendar Listing
What: The News
Where: SOMArts Cultural Center (934 Brannan St., between 8th and 9th)
When: Tuesday, April 2, 2013, 7:30pm–9:00pm, house opens 7:00pm
What else: Admission is $5. Advance tickets: thenewsperformance.eventbrite.com/
More Information: http://www.somarts.org/thenews
Bernadette Bohan is a visual and performance artist, singer-songwriter and talk show host. She is the visionary and curator for The Box Factory, an art, community and culture space that she founded in the Mission District in 2007. Bernadette is a first-generation Irish American. She has shown visual art in New York and San Francisco, and has toured musically in the United States, Europe and Indonesia. She is an active member of many creative communities and has been lovingly “adopted” by San Francisco drag queens and performance artists, which informs her curation of The News at SOMArts.
Stephen Eagle Funk, the first person in the military to publicly refuse to participate in the Iraq War, uses theater and art to highlight issues important to his communities. He is artistic director of Veteran Artists and has produced street theater, plays, workshops, as well as 4 annual productions of “Make Drag, Not War!” He is currently working on a major event called “Another World? Is Possible!” on Saturday, April 27, 2013 at the War Memorial Veterans Building.
Yosefine Tinkelman (Opal Eye) was born in 1979 in Somerville, MA and has lived in the East Bay for the past 12 years. Tinkelman is genderqueer and prefers the letter “e” as a pronoun. Tinkelman was the maiden name of the artist’s grandmother, Nora, who powerfully inspires Tinkelman, but whom Tinkelman has never met. California and Mexico Pacific Opaleye fish's tenacity to resist being eaten also inspired Tinkelman, who was once called opal eye by a friend marveling at the opal-like shine of Tinkelman’s eyes. The name stuck and became the name of a music project that fuses sound healing through live performance. Tinklelman worked in environmental politics and activism for 10 years. Lately Tinkelman has been inspired to use more subversive methods to work for change through creation of music, video, healing space and community empowerment.
Kolmel WithLove is the creator of The News. WithLove curates, builds cameras and costumes, collaborates with other artists, makes films, and performs. Her films have screened in a variety of settings including Frameline Film Festival, MIX Mexico, Seattle Center of Contemporary Art, RAID Projects and in the book and DVD project “Strange Attractors.”
WithLove has performed in venues including SOMArts Cultural Center, CounterPULSE, Highways Performance Space, The Velaslavasay Panorama Theatre, The Garage, various galleries, a few living rooms, two very nice leather bars, and a piano lounge.
ABOUT SOMARTS CULTURAL CENTER
SOMArts (South of Market Arts, Resources, Technology, and Services) was founded in 1979 and operates the South of Market Cultural Center, one of four city-owned cultural facilities in San Francisco.
SOMArts supports exhibitions, performances, classes and other collaborations that serve its mission: to promote and nurture art on the community level and foster an appreciation of and respect for all cultures.
For more information about upcoming events, space rentals and technical services, visit www.somarts.org or call 415-863-1414. SOMArts programs are supported by the San Francisco Arts Commission’s Community Arts and Education Program, with funding from Grants for the Arts/San Francisco Hotel Tax Fund and The San Francisco Foundation.
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