DATES Fri, Jul 23, 2021 TIME 7:00–9:00 PM CT Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts
Free Fall 49 by Brendan Fernandes is an ongoing series of live, dance-based performances and installations responding to the shooting at Pulse nightclub in Orlando, FL on June 12, 2016. The work poses the falling body as metaphor for queer politic, and the dance floor as a space for resistance and experiencing agency. During the performance dancers perform on raised platforms to a DJ'd soundtrack responding to the set performed at Pulse the night of the shooting. Over the course of the performance, the music stops and the dancers fall to the floor a total of 49 times: once for each fatal victim of the attack. In the performance, the music always starts again and the dancers stand up again to dance. In the work, dancing and standing back up serve as acts of resistance.
This performance will take place outdoors. The performance will also stream live at twitch.tv/bemiscenter. Twitch account not required.
Conceptualized by Fernandes and DJ’ed by Karsten Sollars, Free Fall 49 will be performed by local dancers.
Image: Brendan Fernandes; Free Fall 49 performed at Getty Museum June 16, 2017; Image courtesy of the J Paul Getty Trust. Photos: Sarah Waldorf and Tristan Bravinder.
