Newsletter #1 – May 10, 2012

I’ll be creating a short new performance in response to Jeremy Mimnagh’s exhibition Nothing Out Of The Ordinary Happened at hub14.

Walk to the Water – action instigator Cathy Gordon

Visual Arts Thematic Residency: Something In The Water; A Search For The Turn In The Backwash led by  Adam Chodzko

Photo credit: Leanne Eisen

Chapter Art Centre, Cardiff Wales

Photo Credit: Cathy Gordon

The intention of LOST AND FOUND is to create contrasting community-inspired projects across Canada, and eventually internationally, that will serve as both a virtual home and a physical space for the memories of people, places, parts of ourselves, and the objects, words, sounds that represent them. To date, LOST AND FOUND projects include:

– Dinner In Berlin / 2012 (in development)

– Jardin Communautaire / 2011

– Mémoire Mile End  / 2010

– Loss In Lansdowne / 2009

Photo Credits: Cathy Gordon & David Ayotte / Participant: Myrtha Guirand

Lost And Found Project: Dinner In Berlin

Dinner In Berlin is a series of six private performances set in six culturally / economically different kitchens across Kitchener intended to be experienced once a week over six weeks. The performances are thematically linked together by a common structure – that of having dinner at someone’s private home while also enjoying a professional theatre performance while sitting around the table. Each performance is created with stories of that particular neighbourhood, woven together from historical records as well as personal anecdotes collected from the surrounding neighbours.

Supported by M T Space through the Ontario Art Council Theatre Creators’ Reserve Program

Star in your own monster movie!

Children begin by creating their own monster personae with costume & make-up. Standing by is a professional photographer ready to take their “glam” photo to put it up on the big screen!  Then, they can go straight to set where the director & D.O.P (director of photography) are waiting to guide them through their own scary scene. Afterwards, they can step into a private screening room to see their own movie!

Movie Monster allows children to deconstruct “scary movies” into the non-threatening building blocks of dress-up & make-believe.

Commissioned by Harbourfront Centre’s HarbourKIDS 2011

Photo Credit: Misha Snyder

Lost And Found Project: Jardin Communautaire

I have been thinking a lot about gardens (click here for blog)… Commissioned by Théâtre Aux Écuries

Ulysses Castellanos, Cathy Gordon and Terrance Houle come together to rethink the implications and  artistic possibilities of remaking the 1970 Hollywood film Little Big Man into a new media performance.

The image above (created by Terrance Houle) was spray-painted on the wall of ATOMIC CENTRE, (Winnipeg) during our March 2011 Residency.

Photo credit: Terrance Houle

Supported by Theatre Gargantua through the Ontario Art Council Theatre Creator’s Reserve Program and hub14 art and performance works

Cabin In The Woods
Mist rolling off the water. Tall grass blowing in the breeze. Fresh dirt gently packed. Cabin In The Woods plays with iconic symbol of the wood cabin transforming it from a benign retreat to an evil house of horrors through the use of simulated atmospheric, sound and light effects. Created by Ulysses Castellanos and Cathy Gordon.

Commissioned by Casa Loma for Nuit Blanche Toronto 2010

Lost And Found Project: Mémoire Mile End

Lost And Found Project travels to Montreal’s Mile End to work with the local community to create Mémoire Mile End: marche un mille dans ses chaussures. Over the course of three weeks, we created a multi-layered project that included both an urban photo exhibition and a multilingual walking tour comprised of stories told by the people who live & work in Mile End.

See Video.

Click here for more information on the Photo Exhibit.

Click here to learn about the Walking Tour.

Supported by Studio 303 and The City of Toronto through Toronto Arts Council, Toronto Arts Foundation and Luminato, Toronto’s Festival of Arts + Creativity.

Art house meets haunted house. Intertwining local ghost stories and pop culture horror flicks, Cathy Gordon and Ulysses Castellanos combine sound, video and performance to create a chilling interactive haunted house experience.

Presented by LabCab Festival at Factory Theatre, Toronto

Bouncing Bride: What Is Down Must Go Up

Join the bouncing bride as her bouncing groom on a mini-trampoline atop a ten-foot wedding cake. Cathy Gordon follows up her last endurance piece ON MY KNEES: a public divorce ceremony, with this light-hearted look at the “bright-side” of divorce. Cake design by Laird MacDonald.

Watch Video

Supported by The Theatre Centre and The Music Gallery

Photo credit: Dustin Parr

NUIT BLANCHE
SATURDAY OCTOBER 3, 2009, 7pm to 7am
ZONE A

The Music Gallery, 197 John Street
Concept & Performance – Cathy Gordon
Cake Design – Laird MacDonald
Wedding DJ – Ulysses Castellanos

BOUNCING BRIDE: What Is Down Must Go Up
Coproduced by The Theatre Centre, The Music Gallery and The Cathy Gordon Collective

Be the bouncing groom to the bouncing bride on your own mini-trampoline atop a ten-foot high wedding cake. Cathy Gordon follows up her last endurance piece ON MY KNEES: a public divorce ceremony,with this light-hearted look at the “bright-side” of divorce.

Projected from within the cake-sculpture will be a series of a hundred positive divorce stories ranging from Canada’s own Maggie & Pierre to personal stories collected for this project. The aim of the work is to expose the untold “happy side” of divorce, which is still regarded negatively in our society.

Request your favourite wedding songs from our very own Wedding DJ, Ulysses Castellanos, and then dance the night away under the stars in the beautiful courtyard of St. George The Martyr’s Church.

Those who wish to venture to the top of the cake, can sign up for a number and then continue dancing while they wait for their turn. Audience members will be allowed one at a time to the top of the cake where they can bounce with the artist (if only for awhile) as her new groom.

Fatigued Nuit Blanchers can also lounge instead – sinking into the cozy “bottom layer” of the cake. Their imprints in the memory-foam with create “waves in the icing” which serves as a physical reminder of their metaphysical traces and the impermanence of all relationships.

BOUNCING BRIDE- TECH RIDER

Loss In Lansdowne was a community art project in the Bloor and Lansdowne neighbourhood. For ten days The (OMK) Cathy Gordon Collective took up residency at The Toronto Free Gallery and reached out to the community – asking them to lend items of personal significance around the theme of loss. Two weeks later the project culminated in a neighbourhood garage sale and multimedia exhibition.

The intention is to recreate versions of Loss In Lansdowne in other communities and to slowly build a network of artists and non-artists over time and space. We want to create a home for all the memories of lost people, places, and parts of ourselves, and the objects that represent them. We call this larger project: LOST AND FOUND.

See Video

Loss In Lansdowne was made possible with a grant from the Ontario Arts Council: Integrated Arts Program.

The (OMK) Cathy Gordon Collective included Megan Flynn and Jeremy Mimnagh as well as many part-time assistants and local participants.

Photo credit: Jeremy Mimnagh

Initially developed through a creative residency at BANFF. Currently seeking finishing funds.

More information

Photo credit: Kathleen Smith

In 2007, Cathy crawled across Toronto in an eight-hour ceremony celebrating her marriage and divorce.

Visit the website

See Slideshow

Photo credit: Craig Macnaughton

Currently in a long-term collaboration with artist Katie Kehoe to develop a series of public installations responding to the original performance of  On My Knees.

See Slideshow

Photo credit: Becky Johnson

Whether a bar or an art party, the Love Note Lady spreads love in any environment. You are invited to send a message to anyone in the room. It can be anonymous or not, the Love Note Lady will be happy to deliver your message for you.

The Love Note Lady has been curated by Jess Dobkin, Rhubarb! Festival, The Untitled Arts Awards and The Inside Out Film Festival.

Inappropriate Dancing

Several times a day I am compelled to dance, but I usually stop myself.  What would happen if I followed my impulses? Would anyone really care? Is this “repression” coming from an outside source or is it all really within myself? Inappropriate Dancing was filmed in 2006 on one of the first cell phone’s with video capability. Kyle Tingley was able to discreetly capture public reaction as I allowed myself one day to follow my impulses.

The film is intended to be accompanied by performance.

Originally commissioned by Moving Picture’s Anatomic Cabaret 2006. Recently screened November 2011 at Dance Series 8:08.

Photo credit: Kyle Tingley

Two girls, a guy, a DV camera and a whole bunch of guest stars, All Day Breakfast is a new approach to video comedy. With just a couple of crazy ideas and a box of cheap wigs, ADB kicked off way back in 2000 and has worked hard to increase its audience base both locally and around the world.

ADB Comedy Videos

BLOODSPURT, DNA 1997  (performer, assistant director, segment choreographer)

Photo Credit: Steve Lucas / Performers: Sigrid Johnson, Darren O’Donnell, Cathy Gordon

Previously the Associate Artist of DNA Theatre, I collaborated on every DNA project with the Artistic Director, Hillar Liitoja, from 1993 to 2003.

During those ten years I also produced a lot of my own work under DNA.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE OF MY WORK -> PAST PROJECTS

Press

Past Projects: Site Specific, Stage, Directing, Choreographing, Performing

Contact Information

Photo Credit: Jeremy Mimnagh

Shoes donated by Heidi Strauss / LOSS IN LANSDOWNE