I thought it would be interesting. I think that in a way, that performance, fellowship, residency kind of program at The Graham on the one hand, it evolved out of … In some ways … The work we do with Lampo and inviting another discipline in to inhabit the house with us. Use the house, think about what is The Graham on the ground, where there’s a Graham in the world, there’s a Graham on the ground. I think we’ve all talked about this a little bit. And thinking about that architecture and design is the lens to think about some of these other disciplines. But inviting is kind of really inviting everybody in and finding ways to intersect with this sort of framework or lens of architecture and design.

And in a way, the performance residency was sort of an accident. It was a kind of like, “Hey, we have a ballroom in Amara, you need some space?” It was this kind of weird broker thing, but that project itself didn’t have so much to do with design. It was really transformative. I mean, I still think of those incredible images of them out in the courtyard with their … This kind of classical setup, and these wild costumes, and that it was really transformative in a way that it felt like a kind of a kindred the radical act in the house. But then it really became clear that this was an opportunity to develop a program because again, we have a ballroom, it’s empty. I mean, it was really out of this … Almost kind of idea on the one hand available space.

And on the other hand, this kind of intersection of maybe specifically also besides the kind of Lampo trajectory dance on the project that we did on Ana and Larry Helprin and looking at … And through that project, we also dove in and invited the dance world in some ways. And so, I think we came across you, Brendan I think you actually kind of … I think you went to the Adam Mar installation?

Yeah.

And then you were launching these two books and kind of approached us. And I just remember saying … I think you said it yourself about, can I apply for that? And I didn’t know that. And independently, I said, well, shouldn’t this guy? He’s here. He would be a great next person for this. And at that time, it was still thinking in a much more traditional sense about performance and about actually may be separated from the other parts of the program. I mean, we didn’t enter into this thinking it’s going to be an exhibition; it’s going to be an installation. And it almost immediately became that.

And I think that that’s really also grounded in this interest in the intersection of performance and architecture, but also just fundamental questions of like what’s space without action? What’s an object without use? What are these really basic ways in which we engage other fields of action? Roselee Goldberg, in her intro to this performance book that they just performed. I will fill that in later. But the design or architecture and performance book that’s Graham supported, she called it a platform for action. And I thought that was a great way of thinking about the beginning of working with you. It was really exploring that platform of action.

Thank you. And I think that it did start organically, where we did a book launch for these two publications, and I think it’s going to be interesting that our collaboration still continues now with a book that will continue the legacy of this project or these projects. But yeah, it became something where we thought about it in a very kind of linear way of performance one time in the ballroom. And then as I spend more and more time in the house, I’m starting to get to understand the house in its physicality and its structure, where stairs would lead to, or just moving on floors and kind of just like … I became a kin to the house. I felt like I was an inhabitant of the house, and it was funny because, like early on …

And I was still new to Chicago. Like I would be working in the house, in the studio, just even moving and feeling the space to understand how a body would move in the house. I remember people would come and pick me up for like a dinner or something. They’re like, “Where is this place? What is this place that you … You live here?” And it was like this. And I was like, “Yeah, it’s my place.” I would lock up and go. And so there was these really interesting feelings of the space. Feeling of intimacy within the house. And again, the collaborative relationship with us like our conversations, our exchanges.

And I remember saying, “I want this.” When we then decided to become more of an exhibition and not a one-time performance, it was like, I want to bring in … I want to change the scope and scale of my work. And I want to work with an architect. I always think about how the body is supported or burdened by structures. And like I always think about walls and floors. And the idea of the body in horizontality versus the body in verticality. And how architectural spaces support and not support. And so that’s how Norman Kelly came in because you were like, “Well, this is someone you need to maybe start a conversation with.”

And so I loved that. It kind of germinated and percolated from one meeting to a conversation, to then this is what it’s going to be. And then it was the introduction of Norman Kelly, and then it became something else. And that’s when we started talking to each other; Thomas and I.

Because I think that on the one hand, like in your work, there was a project like Future Perfect from 2008, which was really architectural, it’s at a scale to architecture; it’s looking specifically at someone like Moshe Safdie. But it was really the work, I think, that you were doing. I think at the same time, and actually maybe in that summer, going into the fall of the Grand Fellowship was the floor and that summer-long installation of the floor. And that it would be this kind of space of experimentation. And this was the project in New York. What was that project called? Or was that the-

Was that the one with the Getty, you mean with the free fall?

No, it wasn’t free fall. It was something you were doing in lower Manhattan. I feel like it was-

I’m sorry, a Steady Pulse. And looking at the dancers and the resistance of the dance floor.

And then the floor became like the-

The medical phase was the space where-

That wasn’t about … And for me, that’s I think when I really started to understand it as an installation, as that … Like how the work would manifest or how it could take on that space within The Graham as an exhibition, opposed to just a kind of … The way maybe we originally went into it thinking it was performance only or something. And I think that it was really actually your work on the floor, and this also this kind of perversion of floor that really immediately made me think of Norman Kelly and really specific … I mean, I had the pleasure of working with them before, but it was really their project, the wrong chair, or wrong chairs. Wrong chair, singular.

Singular or?

Yeah. I don’t know. We had just done a publication with them. But it was really this I think it felt like a similar kind of sensibility to the approach to this archetypal object of changing the way our relationship, our perception, the way we kind of completely conceived something with archetypal Windsor Chair. And that you were doing something specifically with another kind of field discipline, ballet.

And I think that that was our first conversation, Thomas, was this idea of the discipline, the mastery, the masochism of ballet, and how I wanted to make these devices that were seemingly torture devices. These kinds of wicked austere medieval tools that will support the body and then change the body. But they had to be so specific. I remember actually measuring Leah and trying to figure out where will her foot fit on this device? But at the same time, they also were really beautiful. But I think one thing that was really amazing was Thomas just took … And I remember drawing these really weird things. And Thomas was like, “This makes sense. Okay, let’s make sense of this.” And then Thomas took it into his world and produced these amazing renderings that from the drawings, which then took it to the next level of being realized.

I mean, I remember the day. I think I was actually walking through the Chicago Cultural Center when Sarah gave me a call to sit … At first, asked if I had heard of Brendan Fernandes and whether we would be interested in just having a conversation with you about this project. And so, Sarah and classic matchmaker fashion turned me on to a road I was clearly unfamiliar with. Brendan and I think there are many ways of accessing the collaboration. But it was through our ability to not transform, but I would say transposed the instruments of the ballet that you tend to see in training, I guess, as opposed to an actual ballet. Like the barre becoming a cage, and then you introducing us to the world of S&M, and bondage and of … We’ll have to go into the I think the Leather Museum but then also the world of … That I’m more familiar with because I worked for black statue architects. The kind of architects who don’t use computers, and give you a drawing and say make this real.

And as an architect, I mean, finding ways to, I think, filter or transcribe someone else’s two-dimensional vision into something three-dimensional … So I think many kinds of ways of accessing it. I think by chance, I think at the time we were also collaborating in our office with a former ballet dancer, Isabelle Riffard who funny enough, she’s now in Belgium, Sarah, working for a practice in Ghent. But it seemed like a perfect storm of things we had already been working on. People we were currently collaborating with who had an interest in dance and then finding other ways to collaborate with Sarah and The Graham. And I think manifests itself really beautifully as an exercise and collaboration. But also and translating a variety of different elements into this kind of beautifully choreographed sequence. That hopefully, it’s like, you look closely, you don’t even see the objects. You really just see the dancers.

And that was one thing too I love, was specifically at The Graham, the objects … We kind of created something that seemingly felt like it just was part of The Graham, the carpets and the sculptures. It didn’t feel like it was an … It wasn’t an interruption. It was more like a seamless intervention. And I think there’s something there, like when the dancers come into the space, that then they create a different kind of confrontation. There’s a different moment like not saying that one is better than the other. But there ware these two moments when you’re just in the space looking at these devices as sculptures, as architectural stand-ins for where a body would be. But then when the body comes into it, it becomes a different kind of platform.

And that’s when it became a different type of performance. And I think then the audience would watch the dancers where before the audience was walking through the space. And I loved the idea of those kinds of tensions. And I think one of the tensions that worked so well for us is that we brought in so many different collaborations. It was like architecture, it was ballet, and then it was visual arts and theater in this kind of way. And then you have the different subcultures that I think also was so interesting to have this idea of like Leather BDSM, kind of coalescing and also hitting against the idea of ballet.

I got a lot of questions about, “Well, are you making connection that this is both kink?” And I’m like, “Yes, but in different ways, ballet has its fetishized system. But it’s still a dynamic of power, and the same way that BDSM doesn’t …” But I was just kind of conflating them. And I remember when we went to the leather archive, we were looking at just images but also thinking about how the leather archive was started by a ballet dancer, which I still think is so interesting that there was that kind of connection. And so I just loved the conflation of the tensions that come about from the different collaborations that we all bring our individualities. But we made something together that was so unique and challenged.

I think there was also another interesting touchpoint on collaboration early on. I can’t remember if it was Isabelle who brought the Noguchi/Graham book into the mix but remember them looking at that a very kind of … My camera … I can’t think of the word right now, of course, iconic, but it’s one of these kinds of major collaborations between visual arts, sculpture, and dance. And I know that was very inspiring for everyone at that moment and that it’s so based on collaboration, but I think there’s something else really also very interesting and important. Departure from that project or that work together that Noguchi and Graham did, which is this moving from. And it’s actually a way that I think the most common kind of collaboration between in-performance and architecture is set based.

So, in fact those were objects on their own, but they were also, it was like, it was a setup for a performance. And I think what’s really interesting about what you all did together is that it became something else. It became object with a life outside of performance. It became an environment outside of performance. And that was something that we talked about a lot, is that to really use the whole house and use those spaces, it had to on one hand hold those spaces when the performers weren’t there. It had to have … I’ll probably edit this out, but I was going to say integrity. But it had to be something without anyone. And that’s a big transition. From a set, from a prop, even though they are props for movement or position, they’re not a prop in that sense in terms of how they worked within the space.

And I love that idea that it oscillated, but I also loved that you said that it was … You were creating a set. We were creating a space. And I think partially also when Thomas and I were in the space. We were like … Just we’d walk the space and think about … And then from that, that’s how I then started to devise where the choreography would begin, how it would move through the house. They all started off in the devicive but then they all kind of congregate it, and met upstairs, and then they all came back downstairs. And so, I just remember really studying the space, and that was how I began. But then, Thomas and I then started to walk through the house, or feel the house.

And then I remember Thomas talking about thresholds like, “What if we repeat a threshold in that main downstairs space that creates a pathway to almost the devices of scaffolding that hung. We’re giving a space to think about how to move in. And then upstairs, the cage became a version of … It became a space to rest and relax and free themselves from, which was just part of the concept because it’s this outer space. But also that it was looking at past walls that were part of the house. We were looking at also the original divisions of the house when it’s in its original form.

And I kind of love that Thomas, you opened my head and mind to see things in a different way, which is what’s so important to the collaboration. And that’s also why, I think, working with you for this project gave again a new set of scope to think through over like materials. I’ll be like, “What about this material?” You’re like, “Well, what about this material?” So I think it just kind of brought the synergies of two entities together to expand and then really putting architecture and dance together in an origin, in a house that supports … That is an architect or is already an architectural spectacle.

Well, I think … I mean, the way I was educated in architecture is a conflation of the body. The objects that kind of sit within the space and the space itself. And I think your practice, Brendan is one that is also trying to make a statement within those three elements at all times. I think it was challenging for me that with the project, is we’re often asked to design spaces or objects in ways that are maybe flexible or open. Maybe not as open as I think like Cranbrook teaches. And people like Jonathan Michi practice where these objects have names or functions that are meant to instill ambiguity. I think with this project, it felt like there was such a … Not just because I think the cultural, and the traditions of ballet itself, there was just a prescribed sense of how the body needed to engage both with the space or with the objects. It was unlike anything I’d ever done before.

It started reminding me of obviously a Noguchi, and there’s a primitiveness to the way that object is understood. But even reminding me back to the way, I was an architect, which was to measure bricks based on … Or to measure anything based on how the human body … The bricks unit is something that is meant to replicate the size of the hand, for example. And I think with all of the devices … And maybe the cage has maybe the one exception. The cage being maybe the most open-ended object but with all of the devices having to index the body. In some way, I felt it was really challenging to find a way to really replace what is already a more beautiful artifact in a space, which is to see a ballet dancer holding a pose, and finding ways to do that with static objects was the challenge.

And that’s why I think to go back to your sketches, I think our approach was always to try and reduce the sketches to the most elemental geometries or details that would allow someone to see beyond the object and replace that line figure with the body. And I’m a-

Sorry, I just have to share this because I was looking at … Can you see my screen?

Yeah.

So I am kind of trying to get ready for today. I was going through years of our correspondence. And I had actually forgotten about this series of drawings, and they were … This is when Leah is in the space. So these are taken … You guys were all there, I think, Brendan. And you’re having Leah go through these positions and that these just really incredible set of drawings of connecting, I don’t know, these geometries to these movements that really are in this phase. I think in the project, it’s before those articulations of those objects, it’s really … This is just such a stunning also series of a kind of collage. And I’d completely forgotten about these. And how you can I think, also see so much of what ended up happening. And even though they appear much differently like that geometry, and body, and exactly everything you were just talking about. Thomas, I really see it diagrammatically in this kind of set of images.

I think that’s the challenge with a collaboration like this, is that they’re … In no way can we ever match the beauty of the performance with an object. And so, the best you can do is try and use the object, I think, to alter one’s eventual reading of the performance. Potentially inspire someone to see their performance differently when they finally see it. Which is why I think the show works so well, whether it was at The Graham or at The Whitney, is that the best way to see the show would have been to see it performed, and then to see it without bodies to see it twice.

Definitely. Because I know a lot of people would say to me like, “Oh, we missed the performance.” But you still get something from singing without bodies. But of course, I think you need to see it twice. But I had seen those drawings as I was looking at some other drawings today in prep for this where Thomas would create images of Leah. And then I would end the position that I had picked, the five positions, and then I would start to draw around them and create this … And some of them I think, early on those devices became … They were large, and they were ropes, and there were these things. And then we really started to come into the process and start to edit and come up with the most streamlined kind of object. Then it became this, became what we see at the end of this, but it’s still affected the body.

And I think that’s something that’s really important. It’s like these things affected a body. It allowed the dancer to do them for longer periods of time, but it’s still fatigued and labored the body. And that was part of the work. Was it that how do they work with these devices to challenge themselves, but to also challenge and to continue to almost create fortitude? And I remember specifically for The Whitney, because we had I think the performances are five hours long, and they had a schedule of when they would be in certain devices. Certain dancers started to trade off their shifts because they were like, “I don’t want to be in device number one, I hate device number one. You do one, you’re better at one.” And one was, first position arms, and first feet, and in fifth or sixth. And I just remember they just would find ways of trading because there are certain bodies didn’t want to do it in certain ways. And then I started thinking about how we also … When we made them with Thomas, we were really thinking specifically to do Leah’s body.

And I think to that end; the objects were inflexible. They’re not designed for multiple types of bodies. I think to kind of have used a model who I believe, in your words, was not characteristically ideal by the standards of the ballet for many reasons. That’s where I got really fascinated as well. Like I’m a-

Do you remember all the-

The students of mannerism that I love people who challenge ideal proportions and take on status quo of what beauty means, and I think Leah was a great entry point into, I guess, making a bit of a burlesque out of ballet.

I think that that was super important because, also remember we started looking at the kind of written standards of a ballet body, which we then started to use that as what would we put at … What became when we did the drawings, that was the standard that was against the exactly … And these were the quote-unquote standards of arm length, body weight, and then we put these … And then we created based on that.

Right. First, I think that … I mean, it’s so exciting to hear that and how other dancers, not Leah’s respond to the devices because it should be challenging for other reasons.

I also found that they started to take liberties and find other ways to use them. So, for example, arabesque was a back arabesque, but they would flip their foot forward and hold into it to create a front stretch. And I liked that they gave themselves agency in that way to be part of it. I think also with The Whitney we were able to do it a hundred times. And so in that, they just learned it in a different way. And they just-

I was also just going to say that I remember that being also a challenge in the beginning in that. So, if the objects were about complete control and overextending positions, and this idealized or exaggerated form. I remember that when the scaffolding, which I always thought of the cage is the free space because you talked about it that way. But I remember you talking about it being challenging to get them to take agency.

100% like the cage, because ballet dancers, they didn’t … Everything else was counted. It was like everything else was given; they knew the timing. But the cage was like, “Here, you have 10 minutes of free time. Here you have 10 minutes to stretch out to release.” But in that, they also were like, “I still need you to tell me what to do, because this is a performance, and it’s taking on this way of that we … Bodies are watching us, we have eyes against us.” And so I was like, “You can just stand there for example, if you want.” And they were like, “Okay, but …” And they did because they wouldn’t see that as being performing, they want to be jumping or turning. So even the act of stillness, or resting, or breathing, which I push as an act of them dance making, is part of that piece.

And the Joffrey Academy dancers, at first they were very timid and shy, and I was like, “Go up to the audience. They’ll move when you get there.” And they’re like, “Will they?” And then when they started to get that and see the power that they had or the agency, they slowly played with it a little bit more. But it was very hard. The cage, which was the space of freedom to kind of rest, to relax, to release, became a very hard place for them. And that’s I think where the differences in contract and release when we make … It’s more contemporary modern dance they will take more liberty to experiment to … They were doing things on the chairs that I was like, “Oh my God, what are you doing?” They just came up with such interesting proposals of how they would move their body, but always starting with the position where they would sit on the chair and the contraction. So, their abdominals are holding the chair in place and then holding this position, very typical grant position called pleading until they would have to let go. And then they would improvise, and there they found it they had no issue, but it was with the ballet dancers that they were like, “No, I need to know what to do, every step.”

I just wanted to return to the … I don’t know if we all remember this, but at first, it was this idea of, it’s almost like fidelity to the house or to the … Here it’s like this idea that it would just come out of the existing molding, that it would sort of be an extension of the house. And that, I mean, this is an incredible image. And it’s strange that we never showed Nellie this, but how Nellie’s … Actually, Nellie’s installation, we realized part of that in a funny way. But you also both took on that space, but how do you go from … This to me is very different than free space. You’re still occupying that this was a core between two rooms. It was like a very intimate space. It was the bathroom to shared closets. But I’m interested in; I know that there was a lot of exploration early on. And again, this kind of matching, or seemingly coming out of the very architecture and design of the house. And that this is this idea of the molding literally extending as very different than the Cedric price ask, you know scaffold. So, maybe, it’d be interesting to talk about that, just that transition and the project itself.

I think part of that came out of the idea of just having time. I think one of the biggest things for me was that this project gave … It was a year in process of conversation, of discussions, because it was started with this residency and then it led into what became an exhibition. So, I think we had a lot of time to have exchange, to have dialogues. It’s actually so nice to see these images because I only focused on what we now see as the finished product. And then going back to this, I’m like, “Oh, well, duh, this makes so much sense.” I think time and process was something that was really relevant to this project because it gave me the time to really flush things through and to have conversations with Thomas and to experiment with what could be some of these things I would’ve never have thought could have been done.

It’s like a one-time performance doesn’t allow for this type of production as well. And I think that was something that was really, it was amazing the idea of production. Even going with Thomas to Jason Studio and looking at woods or just picking out stains. The kind of idea of, there’s a larger sense of popping circumstance. Normally, when I make a performance, I’m thinking about purely, how would I make movement? How it’s affected by a space. But in a very quick time turn around, I’m like, “Okay, the stage kind of works. Let’s figure this out. And then we … Or this museum space.” And so, here, I really felt intimate with so many moments of like, I understand The Graham. I remember being like, “Oh, I know if I walk here, there’ll be a creek.” Because you just remembered where the creeks are.

And I remember eventually too like when they did the performance, we didn’t buff the floors. We like left the floor so you could let the do of the dancers’ bodies on the floor. But I also remember the dancers also saying, “I’m having a … The floor’s slippery” These floors are slippery just by nature. So how do we … So we start just thinking about ways that their bodies had to then relate, and then still activate the space of the house. So I remember … Who was it? Who put water? It was … I’m just forgetting his name right now. We’ll have to fill this in. Italian dancer who … The young male, Italian dancer I’m just forgetting-

Who was from Joffrey?

Yeah. He would put water … He would soak his feet in the bathtub before he went on. He would be like, let’s do this-

Amazing. I hadn’t heard that.

Hide her shoes. And then he could … He was like, “Then I create some friction on the floor because I don’t want to slip.” Antonio. And I just was thinking about also how the dancers were trying to think about their bodies and how their bodies would move in that phase.

I want to pick up on that because you also said something very early on that transference of that … That we’ve been focusing on the dancers, the performance, their interaction with the objects, and the space. But I think equally important was the audience, and that you envisioned this as a space in which they could confront their own bodies.

And I think that there was that confrontation because of proximity. And again, people came into that Graham of believing there’s going to be a performance and people were like, “When’s it starting?” And I’d be like, “It already started.” Because they were upstairs, because people kind of gathered upstairs, and then I was like, “Oh, it’s already starting downstairs.” But then I think people were watching their bodies so carefully, because they were also moving with the dancers because if the dancers went upstairs, then they followed them. Or the dancers came towards them; they would move. But I think when they were doing barre, for example, on the thresholds of the fireplace and you’re seeing these bodies that normally we de-humanized because on stage we just see it as being effortless.

But here, you’re seeing the labor, you’re seeing the fatigue, you’re seeing them breathe. You’re hearing them exhale. And I think that was a really important moment to confront a body. And someone said to me, why are all your dancers so beautiful? And I was like, “Beauty, in what way?” They’re like, “Physical.” So I was like, “Well they’re physical, because they’re athletes. But also, beauty has many definitions, but these movers are athletes.” And so, there was that kind of confrontation because of the proximity of how close the body was. Or if the body was in a device, they’re holding it, and they’re seeing how they’re shaking or moving. And that for me also comes out of the notion of kink and the idea of fetishization because ballet dancers, we do crazy things for our body.

Like we rotate our hips to a degree that not everyone else can do. Or we’d like to think about our feet. And Master and Form came from my narrative, where the ballet world didn’t like my feet. And I would use a wooden device, a foot stretcher to bind my feet, to give me the arches. And then what I was thinking for Master and Form was making full-body structures that would affect the whole body that reminded me of BDSM furniture. And that was kind of the beginnings. But yes, the audience definitely has to confront themselves. And I remember one time someone was watching me, and I looked at one of the dancers because I didn’t say anything. Because at this point, they’re in it, but I was also thinking it. Because one of them wasn’t in full turnout, and they noticed me looking, and then they slowly corrected themselves. But that’s such a ballet thing.

And someone said, did you just see what you did to them? And I was like, “I didn’t mean to, and I didn’t want to.” And this was like, “Oh, okay. They’re not fully turned out.” But it was just that dynamic that the piece was called the Master and Form. But who is the master? There were so many kinds of masters within the collaborative space. But I also was trying to think about how do we break down those cultural hegemonies that there’s one master or there’s one way of doing it. And that’s why I think also the challenge of working with the devices with different dancers, they all adjusted, they all adapted. And so did the audience. As well as, they’d be confronted or watching someone sweat, they also were having a moment of like, “My body can’t do that, or my body could do that.” And there was a different back and forth with people’s questioning of what was going on because of proximity as well.

So, the opening, even the dancers, had a hard time because there was so many people there. I was like, “When we did it in rehearsal, it felt great because there was no one there. But then the night of our opening, there was just this climate where dancer and body here. And that’s one of the things; the challenge now is that proximity. Can that even happen now through social distancing? Like what does that all mean? And that’s just another thing that we can edit that out, but I just have been thinking-

I was just thinking of the same thing. I mean, I was thinking of that-

But that’s sort of proximity, that kind of durational experience, even pre-pandemic creates a sort of discomfort within the audience. I would imagine. Like personally, I felt awkward staring too long when I would notice someone else looking at me, looking at the dancer, when in reality, they were probably looking beyond me and another dancer. So in many ways, they are … I don’t know, it’s kind of twofold. Because in some ways, it’s not … It’s kind of choreographed and designed to not mimic an actual ballet performance, but maybe more closely approximate training, which I would argue in any sports. You refer to them as athletes. There is a very different kind of spectator-performer relationship. Training allows for error. Training allows for a different kind of labor to take place. And it really kind of subverts, I think, subject-object relationship when you allow an audience member to spend so much time so close, and in that setting. And for me, that’s

Also on these-

Go ahead, Sarah, sorry.

I was going to say also have these isolated moments. These are these moments that you’re actually not supposed to see. It wasn’t the choreographed sequence of things. It was the objects andthe individual spaces to perform a pose or to kind of not meditate, but in a way, you’ve seem getting in and beyond a pose. It’s like, you don’t have access to that. That also changes the relationship between what your expectations of viewing dance are. Your expectation of an expert, an exhibition, a performance, a Joffrey, ballet dancers. I mean, all of these expectations that kind of installation broke those down, I think.

And I think also the expectations of the audience, the audience came with a certain moment, we got questions like, “This is a dance performance, are there tickets?” So those advocates or people were like, “I can’t stay the whole time. Is that okay?” And I’m like, “Yeah.” Or that we built this dance this installation throughout the house, but every time the dancers went into a space and start to perform, everyone created a stage. There was a proximity between the dancers and especially The Whitney. They all stood on that first wall against the windows and then would watch, and they had the invitation to enter the space and walk around, but no one did it. But as soon as the dancers left, then they’d start to walk around the object like sculptures.

And that’s where I would say context for me was personally, like much richer … And you can keep this in the interview … At The Graham than The Whitney because also of how the program, I think, better mis-aligns itself with the sensibility of the performance. So it feels more fitting to look at sculpture inside of the museum or durational performance art inside of a museum. Do it inside the house, allow it to operate like a Brian Eno song where you can ignore it, or pay attention to it, or have a glass of wine amidst it, and make stairs, and use bathrooms in and around it. And I felt like that was also something maybe to come back to, that collage, Sarah. I think that’s where maybe our first contribution to the collaboration was. Looking very closely at the house as a specific point of departure for Brendan to be in thinking about the way the dancers could use the house.

Quite literally trying to kind of extrude molding into open space, to maybe put pressure on the house to become literal appendages for the dancers to lean on. But that’s what I would say, context. And this is usually how we start. As like we’re as literal as possible when it comes to context. And then, through the collaboration typically with the client, we believe that context grows. And that’s where I think kink became more crucial to the context. And I think that allowed us to transplant elements from other contexts into The Graham specifically like a cage that was meant to, yes, resemble the kind of cage you might find in a kink club. But then also proportioned in a way that would mimic about ballet barre in a studio.

And I remember also with the cage; there was a moment where we kind of had it was porous, so a body could walk through it. Wow.

This is Brendan’s catch. He’s a great-

And that-

You know, drawing a 2D and 3D simultaneously, it’s so good.

But that kind of weirdness that no one would go into it. Like no one was still … it created this barrier. And I feel like sometimes like that was something that was so interesting about the cage because, within The Graham, it really did create fake walls. But there was so porous, but people were like, “Nope, we can’t go through it.”

And that’s what I would say for a neat person; it is going to be a sign-up. Like some of the stuff that maybe wasn’t so visible was really superficial and surface about treating surface specifically. Like when we try to do high gloss a painting, wall paintings that weren’t quite as reflective as we wanted them to be in that collage. But again, experimenting with other forms of, I guess, quoting the house and the context.

But I love the idea again of repeating thresholds. Repeating thresholds to create rhythm, which became dance scores or dance patterns-

They were a form of notation.

Like a form of notation and I think that was really beautiful. And I think for the-

We brought that into The Whitney as well, with a mullion spacing across the walls.

And that gave them a moment of rhythm. It created repetition, and it created movement, and in the space through thinking about the architecture. And I think that was something that was really important. Or I think about it again with the threshold of the doorway in the downstairs space with the pink scaffolding that was a sort of suspended. And it kind of also created that hallway, that grand hallway to run through. But it also created a cadence. And I love that idea of putting cadence and repetition. And it’s a feeling of score through architectural devices. And it really gave the dancers another moment to be like, “Oh, I can play with the space in a different way.” And I think one thing to go back to them, this idea of play, I always called them playgrounds. Again, referencing from Noguchi, but the idea of, they were like BDSM playgrounds.

And I always talked a lot about this idea of furniture intimacy that the dancer had an intimate moment with the furniture. And again, thinking back to BDSM furniture, and there’s this idea that when there’s an intimate touch between the body to the device, we always had leather, so skin to skin. And I thought that also was a really interesting kind of space. Again, a collaboration, where maybe the device is collaborating with the body. I don’t know because there’s a softer touch, it’s allowing it to do it in a certain way. And I kind of really push that a little bit when I was talking to them about their movements to think that they are one with the object. It’s not like they’re fighting with the object that this object is an analog cyborg, that’s an extension of their body. And that became something that they really took on as a concept in the process.

I’m wondering … This is going back a little bit to just before you started the line of thought, but maybe for the two of you to also talk a little bit about this relationship between the score and the plan. So the score and performance, the plan in architecture. And on one hand, you’re kind of just; we’re talking about it as it’s very articulated the spatial cadence. I love that you remember that as pink. I think we should make a drawing of all of that whole thing is pink, it was white. But I love that it’s pink in your mind. But-

I think the collages that we did … Brendan, will you pick the pink?

Yeah.

I guess like overlay.

I got it. Because I was like, “Hmm, I thought it was pink.”. But maybe just I think that that’s also a really important element here that relationship between score and plan.

Well, I think score for me is always important because that keeps a way of understanding and archiving the dance. And part of the score was like you can’t put a game plan. But for the dancers to know what they would have to do in the space, for how long, and how we would transition, and one thing that was really important was having that person be the timekeeper who would like “Ava” and snapped. And at The Whitney, it became such an important thing. The snap became more involved. But I think that the score was the movement trajectory, this start to finish, it gave you the whole … And I had to lay it out for them. And I think we did it for an hour at The Graham where it was longer at The Whitney. But I think then in Tandem; the architecture plan also allowed the score to be because it dictated what things would be.

And so I think it was like before, I did any of the movement scores, it was building the plan with Thomas. What was going to happen in this house? What were we going to do in this room? And then I started to think more about how linearness … That beginning and ending would be.

I think it was fluid Sarah from the start. I think we understood that the area of influence for a device or for the cage was specific to either one body or maybe three or four bodies. And Brendan would essentially guide the object locations. And I think, was maybe also more important about how to position them within the plan themselves was that also consider the amount of space the audience would have relative to sidelines through the gallery spaces, which is why I would say at the layout of The Graham again feels a lot more integrated with the plan. Whereas at The Whitney, we were allowed to project a very rigid symmetry onto the gallery space by virtue of that. I think like the wall-

I think I can honestly say that The Graham was more of an intimate space, it’s a home, and it’s made … It has softwood, and the lighting is softer. And at The Whitney, it became more clinical. And that’s why I kind of made the snap even more … It changed the dance a little bit because it had adapted to the space, and it definitely followed the same score, but it became adapted, and it was transitioning and becoming something else, which I think is fine. But it definitely had a different kind of feel at The Graham partially also because it was just moving around the space like you didn’t know where they were.

And I don’t want to forget then the idea that the sound when the dancers were gone, we recorded the residue of their bodies. And we had a number of speakers that followed the way that they would be. If they were at … 20 minutes, we knew they were upstairs. That sound would come on and so if you were in the space and you heard the sound you kind of would be like … For me, it was playing again on that intimacy of the space or the history of the space that there’s these almost ghostly bodies moving through the space when the dancers aren’t there. So it kind of plays on the idea of the haunting, for example. And that was part of that. And at The Whitney, it came on when the dancers left, but it had a different feeling. It wasn’t a haunting; it was more like, “Oh, there’s the sound of bodies in the space.”

I think there’s something too about the combination of the institutional structures of Graham versus Whitney, the dancers in both Chicago and then New York where they sort of were in their careers and something about the … I kind of just … In my head, I see these sort of diagrams of the plan in Chicago, if you were to sort of draw out all of these different combinations of where the audience was because it actually did completely get disrupted. Like at Whitney, it was kind of people wanted the edges, and they watched the performance, and then The Graham, you couldn’t really do that. And so, even then over time, you got people feeling more comfortable and inserting themselves in places that were actually kind of disruptive, but there was something about, I think that these younger dancers in Chicago, or just maybe where they are in their career, I’m not sure if they were at the end or-

Or they would come?

Yeah. But there was somehow this sensation that everybody was working it out together. Like they were sort of … Both audience and dancers were trying to negotiate and figure out how this was working. And then both got more confident as the night went on. And as the performances went on whereas there was a kind of different, incredible in its own way. But this kind of incredible polish in New York from the kind of gravitas of the prima ballerina and these … Just, you felt a different kind of, I think, energy of how these things were playing out in space, I guess.

Give me … I’m going to have to break for one minute and give Lily an iPad. Just continue.

Did you hear it? Was she talking to him?

It must’ve been like a text. Like, “Give me that iPad.”

I was like, “Wait, how did you know?”

Oh my gosh. I know, I know.

My friend was talking about homeschooling, and I was like, “Oh my God, I couldn’t imagine homeschooling right now.”

It’s no joke.

Are you going to staying in Seattle for the [inaudible 00:55:09]

I don’t know. I mean, we were coming home at some point, but then it’s like things are so bad in Chicago that it’s-

I think things are getting kind of bad in Chicago again.

I know. So I don’t know, but it’s all of those hard-

It’s getting a little scary with what was happening, so I’m like, “Ekes.” It’s … But yeah, we’ll figure it out. Seattle’s a nice place to be or just Washington.

Yeah. No. We can’t complain unless you fall off a log; it’s awful.

It’s awful. So thank you again, like you’re having a crazy … Your tooth is all better?

Guess what, and my tooth is … I have a new crown. I’m getting all this stuff worked out.

Yeah. I have a quick question, maybe a more technical question. Once I have this, I’m going to … Do you have anyone who can transcribe it?

Hi Sarah.

Hi Lilly.

Sorry to interrupt.

Hi.

Just say hi really quick to Sarah.

I like your show.

Hi.

Then you can say hello.

I really want to look behind this-

Good for you.

Cute. Someone told me there’s a webpage called Rev that can just do it really fast, and then we can edit it from there. Do you know anything about that?

I don’t. You know what, though, there is one thing I think, that there is some kind of setting we could have started with that would have made it at least give some kind of transcription. But I don’t know if you can go back and do that. Actually, because we just did this with the CAV, but you know what? They are trying to solve that for a program that they just did. So I will … I think they might have a transcription service. That’s in-expensive that is fast. So I will circle back to you on that.

But then if we can make a Google doc and then go back and forth and just edit it or-

Ask some questions, ask some answers.

Yes, exactly. So we’re at an hour and 10.

10.

Do we want to think about … So we don’t have thousands of words to edit?

Yeah. I mean, I don’t know. I don’t know if I have any parting thoughts yet because I don’t know if I have a brain, but-

Maybe a good thing is to take what we have and then edit it or something. And then also just have an intro and then a conclusion to this conversation.

How’s the book coming together?

Really awesome. So all the texts are coming in, and Al can send you guys a meeting with Platform who did … Who was based in Chicago. Who’s doing the rendering, send the graphic design, which I really think it’s beautiful. So I’ll send you guys something-

What are they called?

Platform.

Oh, Platform?

Yeah, they did all this stuff for me in … for MCA.

Cool.

Did MCA collect that thing? Did the MCA collect the platform?

The platform. They collected as a donation, otherwise, they didn’t want it.

But did they collect it?

It’s still going through the process because it’s been like that code for-

I mean, we don’t have to talk about that now, but I think that would be an interesting way to wrap this up in a way would be to talk about how you all continue to work together as … I think that that’s so good.

I would love that. And I think also because we had Noguchi, we had Wesleyan, we had it was like Norman Kelly and Brendan Fernandes here. Like there would be more this year, but I’m not doing anything. So I’m just thinking a lot like this right now.

I will say, Brendan. And this is something where … Because I think I would like to add, and I don’t know if it needs to make it an interview. But how grateful we have felt being asked to hop in the car for this ride. As I mean, it was your fellowship at The Graham foundation. Yours and Sarah’s invitation for us to kind of join. And the same for Noguchi, Whitney, Wesleyan, and we’d like to eventually return the favor. And recently, I’m going to bring it up, but it’s kind of bittersweet because it was a loss. But we were asked to put together a proposal for renovating this $3 million Howard Van Doren Shaw house in Highland Park. And the owner is a big fan of yours, not collected your work yet, would like to, and was really incentivized to have us propose something that might include your work in the project. Now he ended up going with a different architect for different reasons, but that was the first time where it felt like we could bring you along for the kind of rides that we’re trying to take with-

And I will be there for sure. Because it just makes sense. But also remember early on last year, you guys were putting up a proposal for PS1, and we were thinking about how could we then interject-

Exactly. Absolutely.

And so I still think we should think about those things in the future. And that’s … I mean, I’m so grateful for the collaboration because it continued and it definitely affects the way I now make … And so, I’m still thinking, and so there’s a little bit of a pause this year. But when we come back, we’ll be doing more things. So I’m happy, and that’s really exciting.

And I think for The Graham, there’s nothing more thrilling than, I don’t know. I think that this project really embodies if we could split-play any small part in helping to make something happen that we take the kind of resources that we have that often people are selected to bring something in that you’ve already done. But to be able to kind of collaborate and put all of our team and forces together to help you do something else again, in this context of architecture and this framework. But that I think this project for so many reasons and we’ve been really lucky that this is a … I feel like a numb … I think all of the fellowships we’ve done have really just clearly made such valuable contributions to discourse to how we’re thinking about architecture, design space movement in the space, all of these issues. I feel like-

Well it’s so natural I think like for … Obviously, I think someone like the Graham, who I think like Sarah, you always mentioned is the school for the difficult arts. So I think one of the most difficult art practices is finding projects that are worthy of art and architecture coming together to make something new. And I know it seems cliche. Much of Frank Gehry’s career is defined by artists, friends, and collaborations. Or, like for us, we look very closely at the work Caruso St. John does in the background for Thomas Demand exhibitions. And those are the people we aspire towards in every aspect. I feel like of our generation we feel really gifted and honored because not a lot of our generation has this kind of relationship, Brendan.

I think that’s something really important. And I think that’s striving for even like within my work. The social and the political is to find a way that we can be more collaborative. We can be more generous. We can be more exchanging, where it’s not about an eye, or you, it’s about a we. And that’s why I think the work of like Martha Graham with the Noguchi was so important for me. Partially because I come from that background of modern dance. But also the ideas of like Merce Cunningham dance, making work with Robert Rauschenberg and John Cage and those kinds of synergies that just became these-

Work.

Kind of like melded spaces. And I think that’s why I was so excited because I’m like, “We did it and then we continued to do it.” And that, for me, was the most important part. And then thinking about even just the way now this book becomes another extension, and it’s all of us. And so this is why I’m also thrilled that we can have our voices in the book for just that reason, for I guess, of collaboration, exchange, generosity, kindness is the crux of a way that I think the world needs to be more socially and politically involved. And so, I’ll … Maybe we can end up there, and then I can transcribe it, and then we can create a Google Doc, and kind of go back and forth, and see what we have.

That sounds great.

Use the transcript thumbs up?

Who is this amazing art publisher that publishes? I just want to look them up.

That’s Skira.

Skira.

How do you spell that?

S-

S-K-I-R-A.