Frida & Diego in 4 - Dance Theatre Preview
"Frida and Diego in 4" -a tribute to Mexican visual artists Frida Kahlo & Diego Rivera - is a dance theatre piece choreographed and directed by Sandra Hughes, performed by Jerilynn Bedingfield and Michael Hickey to original music by Tom Spach in hand-carved masks created by Mr. Hickey. It previews on Sat., May 30th as part of the Southern Order of Storytellers Spring Story Fest. The performance begins at 7:30 p.m. at the Academy Theatre in Atlanta. "Frida and Diego in 4" then premieres in Denmark on June 18th at the Aeroe International Maskfestival.
The Journey to "Frida & Diego in 4" What emerged during rehearsals for "Frida & Diego in 4" lead to the creation of a piece about Frida's essential passions - her art and Diego Rivera. It lasts a 4 little over minutes. The journey to these handful of minutes took years.
Photo: Sandra Hughes
Performer: Jerilynn Bedingfield
Frida Kahlo said there were two great accidents in her life. The first was a bus accident when she was 15 years old. A handrail skewered her vagina. The second, she said, was Diego Rivera.
The Journey to "Frida & Diego in 4"
I encountered Martha Clarke's "Garden of Earthly Delights" at the Theatre of Nations Festival in Baltimore in 1986. I was there as a reporter for the Atlanta Journal Constitution. At the time I wrote: "Ms. Clarke's work weaves a fabric of images and sounds on a warp of mystery and a weft of reclaimed wonder. … “Garden”, complex and surreal in its composition, maintains tremendous internal logic and integrity throughout.”
Over twenty years later in response to “Garden’s” recent triumphant revival on Broadway Charles Isherwood of the New York Times wrote: “This singular work of dance theatre is without doubt one of the most eerily hypnotic spectacles of flesh in motion ever put on a New York stage.”
Two years after I wrote the article about Ms. Clarke's work I unexpectedly found myself sequestered with her and 9 other Atlanta choreographers at the University of Georgia. Ms. Clarke, an Obie award-winning artist best known for her theatre pieces that interweave text, dance, music and visual art, was there to critique our current work and share her approach to choreography. This outstanding opportunity was made possible by the City of Atlanta, Bureau of Cultural Affairs.
I’d arranged to have “The Loss of Iris” – a combination of dance, mime, music and text composed of rituals from the Japanese Daimyo culture in juxtaposition with those of the American corporate world - performed for Ms. Clarke. At the end of the intensive workshop she suggested I go to my studio alone during the following week with no specific rehearsal plan. I was to use only three randomly selected and unrelated items while there. I chose music and poetry recorded in the Zapotec language – a gift from university students in Mexico who’d befriended me when I'd performed Oaxaca, a long stick and a Chinese mask.
I’d arranged to have “The Loss of Iris” – a combination of dance, mime, music and text composed of rituals from the Japanese Daimyo culture in juxtaposition with those of the American corporate world - performed for Ms. Clarke. At the end of the intensive workshop she suggested I go to my studio alone during the following week with no specific rehearsal plan. I was to use only three randomly selected and unrelated items while there. I chose music and poetry recorded in the Zapotec language – a gift from university students in Mexico who’d befriended me when I'd performed Oaxaca, a long stick and a Chinese mask.
Each day at the studio the same woman appeared to me wrapped in a Mexican flag. Over and over she miscarried her unborn children. Death stalked her wearing the Chinese mask and wielding the long stick. Day after day my body repeatedly embodied these actions until the movements became a ritual.
The following year I went to NYC to perform. While there I visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art. As I stood in line at the gift shop I turned my head to the side and saw the unforgettable eyes and face of the woman who’d mysteriously manifested at my studio. I realized I was looking at a video monitor. I found the video and read the woman's name on the cover - Frida Kahlo. She was a Mexi
can visual artist married to the famous Mexican muralist Diego Rivera.
That same year I was invited to teach and perform in Mexico City at the Universidad Autonoma Metropolitana Iztapalapa. During the Day of the Dead I was taken to Alameda Park to see the life-size ofrenda (offering) of Louis Armstrong and his band and to the village of Mixquic where I witnessed the intensity with which the local people commemorate the traditional festivities associated with El Dia de Los Muertos. When I shared my Frida experiences with my students they insisted I create an ofrenda to her - a performance to honor her life.
The following year I went to NYC to perform. While there I visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art. As I stood in line at the gift shop I turned my head to the side and saw the unforgettable eyes and face of the woman who’d mysteriously manifested at my studio. I realized I was looking at a video monitor. I found the video and read the woman's name on the cover - Frida Kahlo. She was a Mexi
can visual artist married to the famous Mexican muralist Diego Rivera.That same year I was invited to teach and perform in Mexico City at the Universidad Autonoma Metropolitana Iztapalapa. During the Day of the Dead I was taken to Alameda Park to see the life-size ofrenda (offering) of Louis Armstrong and his band and to the village of Mixquic where I witnessed the intensity with which the local people commemorate the traditional festivities associated with El Dia de Los Muertos. When I shared my Frida experiences with my students they insisted I create an ofrenda to her - a performance to honor her life.
Image: Self Portrait by Frida Kahlo
A few months later “Bring Me Yellow Flowers” was performed at an Alternate ROOTS festival at 7 Stages in Atlanta. I adapted “Yellow Flowers”for video. The production showcased at the American Film Institute Video Festival in Los Angeles and was nominated for the Robert Bennett Award. A few years later I wrote a play “Frida –Diego and Me”. It won the Border Book Playwriting Award and received a full production at the Desert PlayFest.
In 1991 I returned to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to experience “Mexico – Splendors of Thirty Centuries”. Frida’s self portrait in a traditional Tehuana costume called “Diego in my Thoughts” was the visual image for the exhibit poster. In 3,000 years of Mexican art Frida Kahlo was the only female artist I saw featured in the exhibit. Soon after this, I read that Frida’s work had eclipsed that of her famous husband in the art market and grown in popularity to command the highest prices of any Latin American artist.
Once she'd tapped into my artistic imagination it seemed impossible to exhaust the ongoing influence and inspiration of someone as fascinating as Frida Kahlo. I didn’t expect "Frida & Diego in 4" anymore than I'd expected to create my first 3 works about her. All were the legacy of Martha Clarke's suggestion - the days I'd spent in the studio with Frida tenaciously hovering in my mind's eye.
