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Screening: The Needle and the Larynx and Worst Gift
Wednesday, April 18, 2018. Doors open 7 pm.
The White Page
3400 Cedar Ave South
Minneapolis, MN 55407

Book your free place here.

The work of London-based artist Marianna Simnett (b.1986, Kingston-upon-Thames, UK) incorporates video, theatrical performance, choral music and fantastical literary parables to investigate the body and its limits. Simnett often presents the body in a state of transformation or distress and her films elicit strong, visceral responses which are felt as well as seen. In advance of Simnett’s May 2018 arrival in Minneapolis, FD13 residency for the arts and The White Page present a screening of the artists’ most recent moving image works The Needle and the Larynx, 2016 (15 minutes, 27 seconds) and Worst Gift, 2017 (18 minutes).

In both videos, Simnett weaves cautionary tales which oscillate between the visceral genre of body horror and the theatricality and menace of dark children’s fables, such as those collected by the Brothers Grimm. Written in rhyme and song, The Needle and the Larynx  places a central, archetypal character, ‘The Girl’, at odds with an authoritarian medical doctor, ‘The Surgeon’, who initially refuses her request to lower her voice but is ultimately forced to accede The Girl’s demand. The story unfolds over slowed footage of the artist having her voice surgically lowered and the narrative is playfully relayed in the artists’ (The Girl’s) newly descended tones.

Worst Gift continues Simnett’s exploration of female subjectivity and bodily integrity as they relate to the power dynamics of the medical profession. It is set in an alternate world in which a voice surgeon (played by real-life surgeon and choral singer Dr. Declan Costello) injects prepubescent boys with a substance to lower their voices. Shot in a Botox factory and theatrical surgery, the film follows a female protagonist (played by the artist) as she ventures on a mission to obtain the substance refused to her by the surgeon.

About the artist:

Marianna Simnett (b. 1986) lives and works in London. Trained in classical music and theatre from a young age, its influence on her work endured as she turned to film, installation, and performance during her BA at Nottingham Trent University in 2007 and her MA at the Slade School of Art in 2013. Simnett’s work has been the subject of several solo exhibitions including a current exhibition at the Zabludowicz Collection (London, UK); Wing-sleepers (Art on the Underground, London, UK) in 2018; Worst Gift, Matt’s Gallery (London, UK) in 2017; Lies, Seventeen Gallery (New York, NY) and Valves Collapse, Seventeen Gallery (London, UK) in 2016; Park Nights, Serpentine Pavilion (London, UK) and Blue Roses, Comar (Isle of Mull, Scotland) in 2015. Simnett was a winner of the Jerwood/FVU Award (2015), the Adrian Carruthers Award (2013) and the William Coldstream Prize (2013). She was shortlisted for the Jarman Award and Paul Hamlyn in 2017.

FD13 residency for the arts welcomes LA-born, Berlin-based artist, writer, activist, and witch Johanna Hedva. Hedva’s residency begins with an astrological writing workshop and concludes with To Those Mad, Sick, Crip Selves a discussion of sickness, care, disability, and healing based on Hedva’s recently published essay “Letter to a Young Doctor” (Jan 2018, Triple Canopy).

Malus Daemon: Temple of ill-omen, Doomed to climb
A Writing Workshop on Storytelling, Fate, and Astrology
Sunday, March 4, from 4 – 7 pm
The Future, 2223 E 35th St, Minneapolis, MN 55407

Can the embrace of fate through mythological stories be a form of rewriting oneself? Can bad luck be reclaimed? How should we value the catharsis of doom? This free writing workshop, led by Johanna Hedva, will focus on astrology, mythology, and storytelling. Hedva, a practicing astrologer raised within traditions of Catholic folk magic and Korean fortune-telling, will help participants explore the cycles and patterns of Hellenistic astrology as possible genres for writing and narrative. Participants are invited to bring their birth information or natal charts as materials to support the writing process.

This workshop takes place at The Future, an apothecary and project space, located in South Minneapolis’ Witch District. Capacity is limited to 10 people. Please book your free place here.

Accessibility note: The environment is not scent free, but contains traces of incense and other perfumes. Cleaning products are made from natural substances without artificial scents. The Future is accessed one step up from the street, and a threshold ramp will be made available. Free street parking is available off E 35th Street. If you have specific questions about access please write info@fd13residency.org at least 3 days in advance of the event. We will make every possible effort to accommodate you.

To Those Mad, Sick, Crip Selves
Thursday, March 8 at 7 pm
company, 1237 4th St NE, Minneapolis, MN 55413

Can we imagine a doctor-patient relationship based on collaboration and trust, on a more holistic view of the patient? How can we conceive of the care we give and receive from others as being enmeshed with our political futures? To Those Mad, Sick, Crip Selves is a re-evaluation of the terms of engagement between patient and doctor, self and institution.

In their recently published epistolary essay “Letter to a Young Doctor” Johanna Hedva invites the reader to imagine how a doctor-patient relationship based on collaboration and trust might serve as a model of political resistance, justice, and healing. Hedva will also read from their new novel, On Hell, which envisions the insurrectionary potential of the crip, queer, and sick body. The reading will be followed by a discussion moderated by Lara Mimosa Montes, Senior Editor of Triple Canopy. Book your free place here.

Accessibility note: company is fully accessible to wheelchair users with ramp access
to the venue on 13th Ave NE. Free street parking is available off 13th Ave NE and 4^th St. ASL interpretation and shuttle service are both available, but please write info@fd13residency.org at least 3 days in advance of the event so we can make every effort possible to accommodate you.

This event is presented with Triple Canopy and made possible with support from Goethe Institut Chicago.

Johanna Hedva is a fourth-generation Los Angelena on their mother’s side and, on their father’s side, the grandchild of a woman who escaped from North Korea. Hedva is the author of the novel, On Hell (2018, Sator Press). Their performances and visual work have been shown at Machine Project, Human Resources LA, the Getty’s 2013 Pacific Standard Time, the LA Architecture and Design Museum, and the Museum of Contemporary Art on the Moon. Their essays, poems, and fiction have appeared or will appear in Triple Canopy, Black Warrior Review, The White Review, Entropy, Mask Magazine, 3:AM, and others. Their ongoing project This Earth, Our Hospital includes the essays “Sick Woman Theory” and “In Defense of De-Persons” and most recently “Letter to a Young Doctor” published by Triple Canopy in January 2018.

 

FD13 residency for the arts welcomes London and Los Angeles–based artist Patrick Staff, our artist-in-residence throughout the month of February. Working across film, installation, dance, and performance, Staff’s practice investigates themes of dissent, labor, and the queer body.

Weed Killer, Screening 
Thurs, Feb 22, 2018 at 7pm, free
Walker Art Center, Bentson Mediatheque
Tickets available via the Walker Art Center

Produced on the occasion of Staff’s recent solo exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, Weed Killer (2017) departs from Catherine Lord’s memoir ‘The Summer of Her Baldness’ (2004), a vivid, often irreverent account of the author’s diagnosis, treatment, and transformation through her experience of breast cancer. Weed Killer suggests a complex relationship to one’s own suffering and draws into focus the fine line between alternately poisonous and curative substances.

A selection of related titles from the Walker’s Ruben/Bentson Moving Image Collection follows the screening, concluding with a Q&A between Staff and Sara Cluggish, Co-Director of FD13 residency for the arts.

This event is co-presented with the Walker Art Center.

Bathing (Drunkenness), Live Performance
Thurs, Mar 1, 2018 at 7pm, free
Performed by Kaya Lovestrand
Company, 1237 4th St NE, Minneapolis, MN 55413. Book your place here.

Over the course of their four week FD13 residency, Staff develops Bathing (Drunkenness) (2018), a series of fluid choreographic gestures enacted by one performer in a shallow pool of water. The performance combines contemporary references alongside Staff’s research into the classical figure of the bather, the drunken revelry of bacchanalia, and spiritello figures which commonly adorn European fountains. Embracing feelings of anxiety induced by stagnant water and its pollution, the performance suggests a complex relationship to gender, intoxication, and desire. Bathing (Drunkenness) is Staff’s first performance choreographed for a live audience since 2013 and continues their examination into themes of contamination, cleanliness, and illness.

This event is co-presented with Company, a new project space and curatorial platform located in Minneapolis’ North East Arts District.

Patrick Staff (b.1987) is an interdisciplinary artist living and working in London, UK and Los Angeles, USA. Their work has been exhibited internationally. Recent solo exhibitions have taken place at MOCA, Los Angeles (2017); Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver, Canada; Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane, Australia (2016); Spike Island, Bristol, UK; and Chisenhale Gallery, London, UK (2015.) Staff’s work was included in the British Art Show 8, and they received the Paul Hamlyn Award for Visual Art in 2015.