Scapegoat Garden: Liturgy|Order|Bridge [SOLD OUT]
Friday, February 9, 2024 at 7:00pm
CFA Theater
$20 general public; $15 senior citizens, Wesleyan faculty/staff/alumni, non-Wesleyan students; $8 Wesleyan students, youth under 18
Saturday, February 10, 2024 at 2:00pm
CFA Theater
$20 general public; $15 senior citizens, Wesleyan faculty/staff/alumni, non-Wesleyan students; $8 Wesleyan students, youth under 18
Saturday, February 10, 2024 at 7:00pm
CFA Theater
$20 general public; $15 senior citizens, Wesleyan faculty/staff/alumni, non-Wesleyan students; $8 Wesleyan students, youth under 18
"Liturgy|Order|Bridge is…inspired by communal embodiment in the Black church."
—Berkshire Magazine
“In our gardens flowers grow to human scale, liturgical vestments adorn more than one body at the same time — we just might bloom ourselves as we sing together, clap together, find virtuosity in a chorus of step touches and bear witness.”
—Deborah Goffe
Scapegoat Garden, directed by Deborah Goffe MA ’19, presents the latest iteration of Liturgy|Order|Bridge, a participatory dance ritual that fuses sacred traditions and secular performance modalities to make porous the border between audience and performance. Calling on Black church traditions, a group of performers, along with a chorus of local artists and change-makers, brings guests into a collective score of movement, clapping, and vocalization.
These performances of Liturgy|Order|Bridge will feature the "Threshold Chorus," which includes Wesleyan student Alisha Simmons '24, Assistant Professor of the Practice in Dance and African American Studies Joya Powell, Embodying Antiracism Community Fellow Kerry Kincy, Library Assistant in Scores and Recordings, the World Music Archives, and Special Collections and Archives Jennifer Hadley '84, MA'86, Chemistry Department Administrative Assistant Camille Smith, and high school student Mary-Amma Blankson. Blankson's father, poet-in-residence for Middletown's Ekklesia Contemporary Ballet Kwamena Blankson, and Embodying Antiracism Community Fellow Barbara McClane will be featured as a "Wisdom Keepers."
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Drawing from practices of Black cultural and religious life, the work is a contemporary ceremony for gathering—through acts of care, hospitality, and shared witness. Liturgy|Order|Bridge stages an encounter through which participants can identify and establish shared connections among and to one another in ways that ripple out beyond the performance itself.
PLEASE NOTE: There is no late seating for this performance. Runtime is approximately 90 minutes with no intermission.
A post-show reception will follow each performance in the South Gallery of the Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery.
Liturgy|Order|Bridge has been developed with support from Creative Capital; and from the New England Foundation for the Arts (NEFA) “New Work New England” program, whose support is made possible with funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, the American Rescue Plan, Seedlings Foundation, the Fund for the Arts at NEFA, and individual donors.
The work was also incubated during a Pillow Lab Residency at Jacob’s Pillow, and is co-commissioned by the Prior Performing Arts Center at the College of the Holy Cross.
An early iteration of the piece was part of New England Dance on Tour at Wesleyan in February 2020.
Seating for this performance is located on the Center for the Arts Theater stage and requires walking down stairs to access the stage. Any patrons that need extra assistance with stairs or are unable to use stairs should contact Associate Director for Programming and Performing Arts Fiona Coffey at least 24 hours in advance of their show to arrange an alternate route to access the stage. She can be reached by email at fcoffey@wesleyan.edu or by phone at 860-685-2693.