I'LL BE YOUR ANIMAL
One actor, 12 min.
The Savannah Wildlife Preserve. Parys, South Africa, 2007.

ABOUT
This performance was conceived as a site-specific piece as part of The Savannah Theatre Project's International Performance Symposium. Borrowing images and techniques from butoh and Zulu tribal dance, as well as recorded music from Brooklyn-based Animal Collective, the piece was a solo exploration of the relationship between actor to audience when placed in a cagelike environment--in this case, the wooden, fenced-in landing of an outdoor tent. The performance took place at night, and began when the spectators were ushered, single-file, over the long distance of the wooden boardwalk leading to the tent. Upon arrival, they met with a white-faced creature in black-and-white striped overalls circling the perimeter of the space in extreme slow motion to a recording of Animal Collective's "I See You Pan." As the music progressed, the creature began to move in a manner increasingly agitated and chaotic, toward which the audience was ushered closer and closer until finally at arms length with the performer, as if spectators in a bizarre and ominous human zoo.