A staff member rushes past, informing audience members to clear the stairs of Catch One nightclub as Linda Mary Montano sings along to Bob Dylan’s “I Could Have Told You.” The stairs are partially cleared, but only for a while. The room is too crowded to fit everyone in.
This is a common occurrence for any performance in an unconventional space, but it speaks to a much larger problem with the Performance Art Museum’s programming of “21 & Over.” It’s inconsistent and disrupts what the organization is trying to achieve: an immersive nightclub made of art in three nights. Trisha Brown Dance Company, Linda Mary Montano, La Pocha Nostra, Carmina Escobar, Elliot Reed, Alima Lee and Terence Koh made up the second performance on Oct. 22 of the immersive evening performance series. While the work of each artistic entity has a strong track record, the execution and environment created by the Performance Art Museum with producers Alejandra Herrera and Jaime McMurry lacked a clear vision to give the artists the right platform to excel.

21 & Over – Samuel Wentz and Ajani Brannum in “Floor of the Forest” by Trisha Brown – Photo by Christopher Wormald, courtesy of Performance Art Museum.
Led by host Miss Barbie-Q, the night began with a work by the influential choreographer Trisha Brown, “Floor of the Forest.” An elevated square frame holding up rope with pants and shirts threaded into each crossing line stood at the center of a large dance floor. Performers Samuel Wentz and Ajani Brannum climbed around the area in undergarments, slowly weaving and wiggling their bodies into the clothing hanging from the rope. Once inside, they let gravity hold them up. The performance was like a human word search, keeping you entertained and curious about where the duo would land next. It was a study of human strength and fabric’s durability. It was a solid program starter yet felt out of place in the nightclub. The piece’s title yearns for an airy and organic environment. The piece’s materials are soft, malleable and natural while its environment is rigid, angsty and dark.

21 & Over – “Spill, An Act of Hydromancy” by Carmina Escobar – Photo by Christopher Wormald, courtesy of Performance Art Museum.
The ongoing pieces of the night, “Spill: An Act of Hydromancy” by Escobar and “A Night in the Life of La Pocha Nostra’s Vampires” by La Pocha Nostra, had no space to breathe. Escobar is placed at the top of the stairs in a VIP section, inviting people to come up and ask for insight. She provides an answer with theatrical fluids and a melody supplied by “the ancestors.” In execution, the performance lacks a clear concept. Her vocal responses to questions are piercing and profound, textured with timbre and controlled notes. However, the flowing water, literally spat responses and the environment made up of plastic, don’t make the cultural connection the piece says it has. What does the audience gain from the answers? Better yet, for a piece billed as a connection to ancestral roots, what do we learn about the artist’s roots? The performance itself doesn’t provide insight to these queries.

21 & Over – “A Night in the Life of La Pocha Nostra’s Vampires” by La Pocha Nostra – Photo by Christopher Wormald, courtesy of Performance Art Museum.
La Pocho Nostra’s performance — made up of Balitronica, Guillermo Gómez-Peña, Sarah Stolar, Elle Mehrmand and Shaghayegh Cyrous — felt the most cohesive aesthetically, fitting nicely into the apartment portion of the nightclub. Performers had a gothic look that fully immersed audience members into the space. The scope of the performance disrupted the tone. Gómez-Peña introduced the piece as his own funeral and traversed the packed space to interact with other performers. Here, the movement and world-building fail in their fight against reality. It is particularly present when he approaches a performer with a drum, conducting the person with a baton. He never quite finds stillness or a confident stance, constantly swaying and shuffling his feet. It reveals a lack of specificity. It becomes difficult to discern who is part of the performance and who just so happens to be shuffling too. The funeral façade fades.

21 & Over – Work by Linda Mary Montano – Photo by Christopher Wormald, courtesy of Performance Art Museum.
The best moments of the night were when we saw the artists as humans. Montano does this when she goes against the lyrics in a song during “Lin-Bob Sings Healing Chakra Songs.” As she sings of heartbreak, there are moments where she authentically lives the lyric. She cries and groans a word way past the end of a verse. She’s not looking for accuracy but embracing her reality.

21 & Over – New work by Elliot Reed – Photo by Christopher Wormald, courtesy of Performance Art Museum.
In Elliot Reed’s new work, he joins Jacqueline Wright, Cristina Sasso, Cheyenne Camille and Tania Mejia on a bare dance floor (the same one from Trisha Brown’s piece). The piece begins with human shushes that sound like gusts of wind. The entire group moves around the space while two people take to the microphones in the corners of the square performance space, and they talk. One person asks, “Describe a machine that erases pain.” The answer is real and unrehearsed. The other person reflects on the temporality of life and her kids’ well-being. These emotional connections happen while the rest of the group follows a directive. In this iteration, it is “to shake.” As the responder is drawn to tears, everyone else shakes, embodying the emotions. It’s raw. The group is not afraid to embrace the nightclub environment either. In one transition, dance music blasts from the speakers and they all dance erratically and without inhibitions. They even get up close and personal with the audience, embracing the grunge, counter-culture aesthetic of the space by going against the traditional ethics of a performance. When the piece settles, they sit in stillness in a line of chairs. After listening to their deepest thoughts and emotions, the moment is heart-wrenching. They aren’t the same people who started the work. You know them and their presence is powerful.
The events in Catch One were inconsistent, but when they worked, they created an astonishing immersive experience. Spread across three separate nights, “21 & Over” would’ve benefited from some trimming and intentional curation to create more space for connection between the artists and the space.
For more information about the Performance Art Museum, please visit their website.
Written by Steven Vargas for LA Dance Chronicle.
Featured image: 21 & Over – Samuel Wentz and Ajani Brannum in “Floor of the Forest” by Trisha Brown – Photo by Christopher Wormald, courtesy of Performance Art Museum.