Culturebot loves PRELUDE! Yes, okay, I curated for three years, but I loved it even before that. Created by the indefatigable and inspiring Frank Hentschker, PRELUDE has established itself as the best way to see new work from all your favorite emerging and established NYC-based artists. This year PRELUDE.11 takes as its starting point the dialogue between recent tendencies in theater, dance and visual art performance. For the first time in PRELUDE’s history, it will use the James Gallery at the Graduate Center as well as the Martin E. Segal Theatre Center so that this interdisciplinary festival can continue to investigate the resonances between the “white cube” and the “black box.” Invitees include Jay Scheib, Temporary Distortion, Sibyl Kempson and Big Dance Theater, Donelle Woolford, Jackie Sibblies Drury, Mac Wellman, Suzanne Bocanegra and Paul Lazar, Half Straddle, Daniel Fish, lumberob, Jake Hooker, Otso Huopaniemi, Elevator Repair Service, Young Jean Lee, Rob Fitterman, Will Holder, Nina Beier, and a host of others, including a new commission from Jackson Pollock Bar. Events occur daily from 4pm-10pm, with selected performances loosely based around the following themes:

· We Present A Presentation: performative lectures, theory-installations, and performances within performances.
· Repurposing: taking preexisting works, events or texts as the basis for new performances
· Text As Texture: creating a musical or performative experience from the materiality of language.

THIS IS GOING TO BE AWESOME!!! DON’T MISS IT!!!

PRELUDE.11
The Eighth Annual PRELUDE Festival

Wednesday Oct 12 – Friday, Oct 14, 2011
FREE and open to the public. First come, first served.
The Martin E. Segal Theatre Center at The Graduate Center, CUNY.
365 Fifth Avenue (at 34th Street) NYC
WWW.PRELUDENYC.ORG

The Martin E. Segal Theatre Center at the Graduate Center, CUNY is pleased to present PRELUDE.11, the eighth annual PRELUDE festival dedicated to artists at the forefront of contemporary New York City theatre, dance and visual art performance. PRELUDE will offer over 20 short performances, readings, and open rehearsals—a completely free sneak-peek into the work being prepared for the 2011/12 season, as well as new commissions and daily panel discussions with artists and performers.

PRELUDE is the annual three-day festival organized by the Martin E. Segal Theater Center at CUNY Graduate Center. It was established in 2003 with the remit of showing the best in New York-based theater and performance. Each year Frank Hentschker, director of the Martin E.Segal Theater Center, assembles a curatorial team to select and organize the program. This year’s PRELUDE has been selected by Claire Bishop (Associate Professor, PhD Program in Art History, CUNY Graduate Center), Rob Marcato (Artistic Line Producer, Signature Theatre Company, NY) and Helen Shaw (Theater critic, Time Out New York). PRELUDE.11’s Producer is Caleb Hammons (Producer, Soho Rep., NY).

All presentations will be held in the James Gallery and the Segal Center at CUNY Graduate Center, 365 Fifth Avenue at 34th Street. A closing night party will be held on Friday 14 October at The Gershwin Hotel, 7 East 27th Street between Fifth and Madison Avenues. All programs are subject to change.