House of Realness
House of Realness offers Wiener Festwochen audiences a glimpse into the American alternative. A utopic space where pleasure is power and black and trans lives matter, House of Realness presents queer ecstatic practice as resistance.
Curated by NYC based American Realness founder and curator Ben Pryor, House of Realness features: vogue ritual healing practice from Wendell Cooper/Mx. Oops with musical performance by STEFA* and guest choreography and performance by Slim Ninja; spectacle rich performance and video works from Narcissister that question representations of gender, racial and sexual identity; song and story of “glamour as resistance” and the practice of performing the self as protest to the heteronormative hegemony of contemporary life from trans-genre artist Justin Vivian Bond with band Matt Ray on piano, Claudia Chopek on violin and Nath Ann Carrera on ukulele; white-guy, medium sized dick, bi-sexual, feminist Emminem on steroids rap from Champagne Jerry who is funny enough for comedy clubs, tight enough for rock clubs, and weird enough for art venues.
Set in a two-stage environment designed by Diego Montoya with Michelle Sutherland with lighting by Sarah Lurie and video animations by Wendell Coooper and Ethan Weinstock, House of Realness offers a space of respite and recharge in a landscape of queer futurity. Get lost, find your future and build it forward.
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Production commissioned by Wiener Festwochen
curated by Ben Pryor
environment by Diego Montoya with Michelle Sutherland
animations by Wendell Cooper and Ethan Weinstock
lighting and production management by Sarah Lurie
with performances from Wendell Cooper/Mx. Oops with STEFA* and Slim Ninja; Narcissister; Justin Vivian Bond with Matt Ray, Claudia Chopek and Nath Ann Carrera; Champagne Jerry