Saturday April 16, @ 6:00pm - Princess Jafar

International sensation and star of stage and screen, Princess Jafar, returns to her hometown of Pittsburgh, PA hot off a world tour to further research and develop a new form of brainwashing. Her plans to control people's minds through the airwaves, TV shows and feature films have all been foiled by her archnemeses N8 Puppets, slowdanger, Gia Fagnelli, Snugglzs, Livefromthecity and the moon baby, but her next plan is even more evil than any before. Your mission is to stop her before it is too late and her brand of saccharine pop singles and mindless TV specials have infected the whole world. Approach with extreme caution and always use a flash when photographing her. End transmission.

Saturday April 23, @ 8:00pm - CACOPHONY by Carson Sestili & Alexis Retcofsky

CACOPHONY is an experimental dance and electronic music show by synthesist Carson Sestili and tap dancer Alexis Retcofsky. The sounds of Retcofsky’s explosive tapping crash through layers of electronic processing guided by Sestili, emerging larger than life in dramatic new shapes. A delay-feedback system absorbs each tap and twists it back on itself in time, accumulating a pulsing, rolling avalanche of sound. In a collaboration that centers improvisation, spontaneity, and play, dancer and musician explore a space at the intersection of movement and sound.

Carson Sestili creates experimental electronic music as Actias. Sestili’s performances center improvisation, often with dynamic systems that evolve autonomously, but respond expressively to input. Sestili’s pieces are both slow-moving, gentle atmospheres and distorted walls of sound, and explore the liminal space between these extremes. Sestili works in live sound for theater and music for the New Hazlett Theater and City of Asylum.

Alexis Retcofsky is a theater artist focused mainly on prop making and dance. She is a teacher, performer, and general stage tech at the Carnegie Performing Arts Center dance school. She is part of the front of house staff at the New Hazlett Theater and freelances as a prop master for local theater companies. She has a BFA in Theater Arts from Point Park University.

Saturday April 30, @ 4:00-6:00pm, 7:00-9:00pm - Ariel /; pvkvsv

Sonic producer pkvsv & interdisciplinary artist Ariel / are collaborating on bringing a temporary solarpunk commons to the AAP gallery. Upon entering the space, visitors will be encouraged to enter into a state of collective resting, relaxation, and non-verbal communication via various supportive structures while a soundscape aimed to reflect on the cycles of water flow in and out of different states.

Ariel / is multidisciplinary artist, educator, performance practitioner, and contemporary butoh dancer that has worked in sound, drawing, painting, collage, holography, theatre and film in commercial as well as experimental environments/projects. Their creative process is often a performance/celebration that simultaneously functions as an archiving of ancestral modalities for long-term wellness and liberation.

pvkvsv (pah•kah'•sah) is an emerging beatmaker, producer, and DJ from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In his music production he expands upon jazz and hip-hop roots & incorporates electronic elements as well as samples from music that moves. His instrumentals are often topped with environmental nature cues to create a more immersive experience for listeners to ground themselves in. pvkvsv released his first album, peels 2, in January 2019 as part of the Stacks Collection by the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh. On MSYH.FM, a Pittsburgh-based independent radio platform, pvkvsv also curates an eclectic mix series called Currents.

Saturday May 7, @ 5:00pm - Vigil - Jessica Fuquay

Jessica Fuquay’s performance Vigil will bring together the strategies of musique concrete, vocal improvisation, and the manipulation of field recordings from her personal archive in order to create ambient sonic textures that explore the affective space of grief. The performance will feature live renditions of compositions made in 2020-2021 as well the debut of new original work.

Jessica Fuquay is a Colombian American interdisciplinary artist, composer, and DJ currently based in Pittsburgh, PA. She makes videos, performances, and sound compositions that activate the embedded histories of specific sites and events through sustained observation, listening, and sometimes intervention. She is currently a MFA Candidate at Carnegie Mellon School of Art in Pittsburgh, PA and has participated in residencies at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Madison, ME and Project Row Houses in Houston, TX.

Thursday May 19, @ 6:00pm - Tara Fay

2019’s Pittsburgh’s Inequality Across Gender and Race is a research study that affirms how Pittsburgh is one of the worst cities in the country for health and economic outcomes of Black women. For this durational performance, I will read this report in its entirety while balancing a steel beam across my shoulders. This act of labor and endurance is a reference to what Black women in this city have to fight against everyday; the marginalization, racism, lack of opportunities, and discrimination. The usage of a steel beam is an obvious allegory to Pittsburgh’s title of the Steel City, but also functions as a more indirect reference to its reputation as the “Most Livable City”, a reputation that has historically excluded Black populations.

Tara Fay’s work consists of a multidisciplinary praxis which exists as a study in duality, a constant work in progress, and a continued exploration of Black female subjectivity, language, selfhood, and self-presentation. Through performance, photography, text, and mixed media works, Fay mines her lived experience for subject matter with a goal to intertwine life and work. Fay describes her practice overall as constantly reframing her own artistic record, as her work grows and evolves.

ongoing - Teal Fitzpatrick

Teal Fitzpatrick is a fiber artist and writer living in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Their work is an ongoing project of giving form to the invisible with particular interest the relationship between symbolic image and interior psychological space. Teal's work is featured in the 2021 Fiber Art Now Emerging Artist Showcase.

About the Jurors

Samira Mendoza is an interdisciplinary performance artist, curator, and educator based in Pittsburgh, PA. Their work centers improvisation through different mediums including sound, sculpture, organizing, and movement to investigate oppressive systems, familial history, and personal experiences. Mendoza is the founder of hodgepodge, an interdisciplinary arts network that features performances, installations, and curated ensembles. Mendoza’s work has been featured at the Experimental Sound Studio, Fuse Factory and Digital Arts Lab, Queens Museum, Panoply Performance Laboratory, Pittsburgh Filmmakers & Pittsburgh Center for the Arts, Public Space One, and the Woods Cooperative. Mendoza serves on the Artists Council for the Kelly Strayhorn Theater and is currently a Distillery Resident artist at the Brew House Association. 

Talia Heiman, curatorial assistant for the 58th Carnegie International, has held curatorial positions at the Center for Contemporary Art and Artis in Tel Aviv, the Institute of Contemporary Art at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, and Museum of Modern Art, New York. She has curated exhibitions and programs at The Kitchen in New York City; the Hessel Museum of Art at Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York; as well as AA|LA Gallery in Los Angeles. She has published catalogue essays for the Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery and the 57th Carnegie International. Heiman received an MA from the Center for Curatorial Studies at Bard College and a BA from New York University.