220 VISIONS of UTOPIA |
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On November 16, 2007, a line of movement was created on the streets of downtown. 15 minutes of beautiful movement quite surprisingly filled the air, expanding everyone's reality, taking the edge off the city at rush hour. |
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In a series of workshops LAPD asked 220 people from in and outside Skid Row to write a about what utopia looks like to them. Through guided improvisation, each group generated a movement sequence inspired by those unique Utopian visions. The resulting creation was a line of movement on the sidewalks that extends the 10 blocks from the heart of Skid Row to City Hall. Every person in the chain has contributed something of their own vision and movement, and because the chain of movement extends unbroken throughout the community, it makes clear that any true Utopian vision includes everyone and excludes no one. |
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| About Utopia/Dystopia | ||
Utopia/dystopia is a series of performance, public art and conversation events that look at the present and future of downtown Los Angeles, with the recognition that one person's Utopia might have the unintended -- or rationalized -- consequence of contributing to the realization of another person's dystopia. A way to avoid “rationalized” ill effects, is first-hand experience. Through the Utopia/dystopia events, we engage a diverse cross section of real people who live, breath, work and play downtown. |
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| Participants | ||
| LA Community Action Network, Transition House, LAMP The Village, LAMP The Safe Haven, Drama Stage Qumran, ‘Skid Row 3 on 3' Basketball team, Buddhist Center Cloverdale, Brent Blair with his Boal class at USC, Arianne MacBean and the Oakwood High Scholl dance class, Tanya Ann Kane-Parry and students at Cal State LA, Para los Ninos, Midnight Mission, Gillian McGinty and her Intergenerational dance group, the Los Angeles Poverty Department, John Malpede, Peter Sellars and Janna Shadduck-Hernandez's students at UCLA, the Youth Justice Coalition Free L.A. High School, the Downtown Women's Center, Saint Vincent's Center, Cynthia Lee, Weba Garretson, Jerry Allyn, Laura Fuller, Jan Kain, Kirsten Smiarowski, Douglas C. Wadl. VOA 9th floor, Sukha and others. | ||
| Route | ||
| Starting at the James Wood Community Center, on the corner of 5th and San Julian Street, the chain will go along 5th Street to Main Street – to 4th Street – to Spring Street – to City Hall. |
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| With support from | ||
| The UTOPIA / dystopia Project is made possible with the support of: the City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs, The Multi-Arts Production Fund of Creative Capital with funding from the Rockefeller Foundation, the Animating Democracy Initiative of Americans for the Arts and The National Endowment for the Arts-Theater Program. The UTOPIA / Dystopia Project involves a number of community partners including, The National Center for the Preservation of Democracy, the Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater (REDCAT), the LA Central Library, the Department of World Arts and Cultures at UCLA, United Coalition East Prevention Program (UCEPP), Central City Community Outreach, LA Community Action Network (LA CAN) and SRO Housing, Inc. | ||