The Tenderloin is often referred to as a Containment Zone by neighborhood activists calling out decades-long institutionalized civic neglect. Skywatchers, a Tenderloin-based performing arts ensemble, upends the concept of containment, exploring instead what is rich, profound, and transformative that the neighborhood and its residents also contain: radical acceptance, resilience, creativity, and fierce compassion. With this work we call for the celebration and ex- pansion of these superpowers which hold the seeds of our collective and shared liberation. ABD/Skywatchers’ upcoming work, From Containment to Expansion, moves with the commu- nity artists of the Tenderloin from relegation to determination. The stories push back against popular notions the Tenderloin is where you end up. But for the resident/artists, the Tender- loin is not where you are put on punishment. The Tenderloin is not Karma. The Tenderloin is not paper towels on a spill. The stories that Containment to Expansion dares to utter are about volition. Poor folks, black folk, women folk, queer folk, drunk folk, drug folk, most folk have to choose to be here. The actors and performers and musicians, through word and rhythm mak- ing, say that they are not fighting to hold on, that they are fighting to break free; Free from the invitation to become crises actors in the exploitation film. They are fighting against type and willfully choosing not to be cast as “Crab in The Barrel No 1, Turf Warlord, Rose in Con- crete, Broken Bottle No. 3, Abandoned Baby Stroller, Building Piss, or Stop and Frisk.” The Tenderloin does not mean what you think it means. Does not mean invisible. Does not mean small. Does not mean nothing. The Tenderloin is not “marked” as in “target” but “marked” as in “glyphed.” The truth shared in From Containment to Expansion, is the Ten- derloin Codex and everything gon’ make sense when they decipher the Tenderloin. Every- thing gon’ be clear when they know its coal that’s singing, not the canary. They gon’ know, the bird don’t speak for us, if the bird sing a song about us being dangerous. It’s deep, but it’s not complex. From Containment to Expansion will draw on histories of resistance, from the liberatory move- ments of the Gullah people of South Carolina’s lowlands to Martin Luther King Jr’s Poor Peo- ple’s campaign of 1968, up to and including the BLM and current iteration of the Poor People’s Campaign. The performance, though based deeply in movement, will employ spoken word, drumming, stick pounding, and song, including a commissioned sound score by internationally recognized singer, choral director, and vocal activist Melanie DeMore, whose artistic and musi- cal history is deeply embedded in the liberatory power of collective song. Working in close col- laboration with Skywatchers’ 20 member ensemble, DeMore blends African roots and rhythms, stick pounding, and African American spirituals to create improvisational and participatory choral arrangements. We talk to God in the Tenderloin. I know God talking about me cuz my ears burning. I know I’m somebody’s prayer. Different from being prayed for. Godliness is a choice I make every time I enter a door or a dream. A conversation not an order. God don’t got no more than ten commandments anyway. Ain’t no glass ceiling between us and God. Ain’t no heaven between
here and God. Ain’t nobody standing in the way of my promotion. I walk to work every day. You’d know that if you decided that living was your job. Your breath smell like Goddrunk. God the designated driver. God get you home safe. God make you laugh like they do in the movies. That’s what that feeling of silliness, of lucidity, of divinity is. That’s what this story is. Differ- ence is, this morning don’t need to spill Mary’s blood. Your radio set to wake you up to the miracle station. This show, inventory your space. Rent God a room. Let God reside in you. Of- fer this, your body as the one to view this human condition through. We are an expansion of God’s territory. God don’t end in the Tenderloin. Forever don’t skip over the Tenderloin. If you hear me singing, “Increase My Territory,” I ain’t asking for more, I’m asking less. That’s the lessen. I’m in the thought of God. Thought of God. Make sense? So unselfish. So much honor. I’m in service. I’m stronger in this wake then when I laid down sleep. I’m go do what is expect- ed of me. You heard right. I’m expected. And anything expected cannot be contained.
FROM CONTAINMENT TO EXPANSION Outdoor Performances Friday through Sunday, May 14-16, 2021 5:30pm performances in the Tenderloin May 14 & 15 2:00pm matinee in the Mission District on May 16 For information about location and times: abdproductions.org
MARVIN K. WHITE, MDIV, is currently serving as the Full-time Minister of Celebration at GLIDE Church in San Francisco. He is a graduate of The Pacific School of Religion, where he earned a MDiv. He is the author of four collections of poetry: Our Name Be Witness; Status ; and the two Lammy-nominated collections last rights and nothin’ ugly fly . He was named one of YBCA’s “100” in 2019. He is articulating a vision of social, prophetic and creative justice through his work as a poet, artist, teacher, collaborator, preacher, cake baker, and Facebook Statustician.
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In Dance | May 2014 | dancersgroup.org
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