ARTBARN is a collective of innovative artists from across disciplines who collaboratively generate original site-specific performance work. Originally developed as a sub-project of Jess K Smith and Company (a sponsored project of Fractured Atlas), ARTBARN has grown tremendously over the last three years and become the primary/sole project of Jess K Smith and Company. The intention of this application is to change the name and description of this project to accurately reflect the work we are doing.
At the center of our process is a core belief that theatre is a dialogue. It is a conversation between a playwright and their world, between performers and an audience, amongst collaborators, between the past and the present and the future, and perhaps most importantly for us, between space and perspective. Something profound happens when actors step outside of the traditional theatre space and speak in the woods or in an old house or in a giant factory. They breathe differently, they move differently, they listen differently, they think differently, and they work differently. Similarly for an audience, when removed from the traditional spectator dynamics involved in sitting in a dark theatre watching a story appear before you, something transformative happens. We are driven by a desire to create more opportunities for artists and audience alike to experience that profound shift in perspective.
ARTBARN develops new work over the course of a year and then converges during an annual retreat in which artists live and work together, rehearse intensively, collaborate deeply, and connect over shared meals. Throughout the process, we commit to looking at the space we are in, the people we have, and the material we are exploring to build something that is exceptionally specific to those unique elements. We invest in artists as true collaborators, inviting them to bring all of their background and resources to the table and asking them to put the work at the center of the process, leaving ego at the door. The yearlong process and retreat culminate in a one-of-a-kind public performance of an original work that’s part theatre, part installation, part walking tour, and part meal.
For the past three years ARTBARN has been selected as a company-in-residence at Byrdcliffe Arts Colony in Woodstock, NY where we have created Home Stretch, This is a Ghost House, and are currently developing a new piece for this summer.
Home Stretch, inspired by Robert Frost’s poem In the Home Stretch and produced as part of the 2013 Byrdcliffe Arts Festival, led audience on a journey following one man, one woman, and a deer. Audience moved through spaces in and around the Eastover building on Byrdcliffe Arts Colony as they watched a couple pack, un-pack, build things, break things, dance, fight, love, and navigate that relentless tension between the toxic but invigorating excitement of the city, the call of the woods and promise of quiet, and the disillusions wrapped up in both.
In 2014 ARTBARN independently produced This is a Ghost House, a new piece, inspired by the notorious hoarders of Harlem, the Collyer brothers in and around the historic White Pines property on Byrdcliffe Arts Colony. The piece explored the psychology of labyrinths and the lengths we go to hide from ourselves. Like Home Stretch, the performances traveled through spaces and weaved in food as part of the performance experience for the audience.
This summer ARTBARN is developing a new piece inspired by William Butler Yeats’ The Second Coming, Shakespeare’s The Tempest, and the inclusive and exclusive properties of a circle. The piece will be staged in and around the Villetta, a building at Byrdcliffe that is the former student dormitory for a short-lived art school on the colony. The unique history of the space has informed the development of the piece already in big and small ways. For the first time, ARTBARN will be expanding to three public performances and feature a full meal for the audience.
As we move forward, ARTBARN is interested in expanding the spaces we work in, the artists we partner with, and the scale, scope and impact of the work we create. To that end, we are already developing next year’s ARTBARN piece, which will be produced in partnership with Seattle-based theatre ensemble, the Satori Group at the Georgetown Steam Plant in south Seattle. The piece will respond to Georgetown Steam Plant’s unique history while breathing new life into a National Historic Site. The space calls for a large piece. We see this as an opportunity to invite new collaborators from across the city into our unique development process over shared meals and intensive investigations of space and story. Thus far, we have been interested in taking inspiration from the four employees who ran the steam plant for the majority of the 1960s and 70s. We see the piece anchored by four workers who must imagine and build a new mythology big enough to account for the growing technological developments infiltrating their world. We expect that a large cast of Seattle artists will help fill out imaginative landscapes for these core characters. We believe that by expanding who has a seat at the table, creating within a new space, and inviting in a new audience, ARTBARN will grow and expand in meaningful ways.
ARTBARN is invested in intentional growth. We will continue to develop partnerships with exceptional artists, companies, spaces, and communities across the country as we develop new site-specific work. As a collective of core artists, we will continually work to bring focused attention to each step of our process. We believe that when we invest in collaboration in a meaningful way and do it by acknowledging and utilizing all the resources in the room, we practice building great communities.
