VIDEO: Art & Design Night Performance Series
The Miami Design District for one night stepped to the forefront of Miami’s performing arts community with a Second Saturday happening.
The inception of the Art & Design Night Performance Series began roughly two months prior to October’s Second Saturday launch when Tiffany Chestler, director of cultural programming for Dacra in the Miami Design District, reached out to Stephanie Ansin and Octavio Campos of Miami Theater Center (MTC), a resident theater located in Miami Shores that is quickly becoming a destination for Miami’s performing arts community.
Ansin and Campos reacted quickly by bringing to the table three acts: playwright Theo Reyna, performance artist Belaxis Buil, and The Project [theatre]. Bird Road Arts District staple SpeakFridays completed the list of performers.
The four acts created complex, 20 minute original pieces specifically designed for the four different Design District spaces in which they performed. Belaxis Buil began the evening with a performance art piece featuring multiple collaborators in the 4141 Building atrium next to MC Kitchen. From there, the audience – which grew with each performance – gradually made their way across the street to the Moore Building atrium where playwright Theo Reyna staged an interactive “lost” scene from his new play Knowledge and Noise. The play is currently in workshop at MTC’s SandBox Series, and Reyna wrote the interactive scene for the Performance Series audience.
The Garden Building hosted the next two acts. The second floor performance space featured The Project [theatre] mounting a flash play in an art gallery setting. The piece was lots of fun and featured art works provided by the Bakehouse Arts Complex.
SpeakFridays took the evening home with a final act outdoors on the rooftop garden. The slight autumn breeze and breathtakingly clear night was a perfect backdrop for the spoken word poets and acoustic musical acts.
The evening’s dénouement featured a 30 minute set by DJ Ben Wash, which brought an entirely different energy and audience to the evening.
Photos by Manny Hernandez
