Debra Disman

Artist

  •

Main Beach

“Swept Away: Love Letter To A Surrogate”

By


I was thrilled to participate in:
“Swept Away: Love Letter To A Surrogate
organized by:
Warren Neidich, Christina Mossaides Strassfield, Anuradha Vikram and Rene Petropoulos  in 2022 to include performances in October 2022 on Long island, NY, and Santa Monica, CA in April 2023.

Swept Away began in September 2022, when 65 Los Angeles County artists sent “love letters” to 65 artists on the East End of Long Island who responded with live performances on East Hampton’s Main Beach in September and October. In April 2023, the reverse took place with 65 West Coast artists creating performances inspired by and in response to their East Coast counterparts’ letters. On April 22 and 23, 2023,  up to five simultaneous performances took place during the hours of 8 am-12 pm and 4-10 pm on Santa Monica State Beach in front of Annenberg Community Beach House.

Participating artists included 18th Street Art Center local artists-in-residence Melissa Altshuler, Debra Disman, Lionel Popkin, Susan Kleinberg, Yrneh Gabon, Marcus Kuiland-Nazario and Dan Kwong.

My work, “The Center Will Not Hold” was performed with Deborah Lynn Irmas and Frida Cano on Santa Monica Beach at the Annenberg Beach House. 

“Swept Away: Love Letter to a Surrogate/s” is a community oriented artistic project that aims to create a transcontinental heartbeat across America. It is hoped that through its combined gestures and performances, a sense of solidarity, so desperately missing today, will emerge with which to confront the ecological catastrophe at our doorstep.”

65 Los Angeles County artists presented live performances over Earth Day Weekend: April 22 and 23, 2023 at the Santa Monica State Beach near the Annenberg Community Beach House on the Pacific Ocean.
“The Center Will Not Hold” was one of them.

A compilation video of the Santa Monica performances can be seen HERE.
https://youtu.be/hJUOFMVXHE0
Video by Matias Munoz-Rodriguez, Fu the Dog Productions

As Warren said: “I hope we created a transcontinental heartbeat.”

HERE is a video of the East Hampton event.
and links to the 4 videos of the nights of performances:

9/10 – https://youtu.be/Z0pnmpt7P2g (Edited by Joe Brondo)
9/17 – https://youtu.be/Dt3WuqcP7Bg (Footage by Anzhelika Tolstikhina, John Driver, Sutton Lynch, and Joe Brondo. Edited by Joe Brondo.)
9/24 – https://youtu.be/2vxMXWWiJio (Footage by Anzhelika Tolstikhina, John Driver, Bronte Zunis, and Joe Brondo. Edited by Joe Brondo.)The list of East End and West Coast artist pairings was as follows:

EAST END ARTISTS  >>  LOS ANGELES ARTISTS:
Suzanne Anker > > Margarethe Drexel
Elena Bajo > > Jasmine Orpilla
Lillian Ball > > Dana Berman Duff
Monica Banks > > Jamie Ross
Dianne Blell > > Lisa Anne Auerbach
Scott Bluedorn > > Robby Herbst
Megan Chaskey > > Lionel Popkin
Scott Chaskey > > Kathryn Andrews
Philippe Cheng > > David Horvitz
Andrea Cote > > Nina Waisman
Ivana Dama > > Rodrigo Arruda
Peter Dayton > > Anita Pace
Katrina Del Mar + Chris Jones > > Taisha Paggett + Meital Yaniv
Jeremy Dennis + Beau Bree Rhee > > Debra Disman
Sabra Moon Elliot > > Rochelle Fabb
Carol Edwards > > Pamela Hudson
Eva Faye > > Patty Chang + David Kelley
Saskia Friedrich > > Fran Siegel
Margaret Garrett > > Susan Kleinberg
Veronica Gonzalez Peña > > Cassandra Marketo
Kimberly Goff > > Cheri Gaulke + Xochi Maberry-Gaulke
Jeremy Grosvenor > > Vincent Johnson
Jerelyn Hanrahan + Laura Ross White > > Andrew Berardini
Candace Hill Montgomery > > Anna Joy Springer
Virva Hinnemo > > Sam Shoemaker
Alice Hope > > Krysten Cunningham
Erica-Lynn Huberty > > Sandeep Mukherjee
Terri Hyland > > Joseph Mosconi
Ruby Jackson > > Alice Könit
No Partner > > Carolyn Castano
Nishan Kazazian > > Beatriz Cortez
Carlos Lama >> No Partner
No Partner > > Badly Licked Bear
Christine Lidrbauch > > Sterling Wells
Donald Lipski > > Raul Baltazar
Sutton Lynch > > Yrneh Gabon Brown
No Partner > > Jiayun Chen
Tanya Minhas > > Allison Wyper
Richard Mothes > > Kristin Calabrese
Michelle Murphy > > Sarah Beadle
Jill Musnicki > > Victoria Vesna
Lois Nesbitt > > Lucia Santini Ribisi
Eileen O’Kane Kornreich > > Iman Person
Jaanika Peerna > > Marcus Kuiland Nazario
Dalton Portella > > Ryat Yezbick
Toni Ross > > Sharon Barnes
David Rothenberg > > May Sun
Will Ryan > > Jody Zellen
Sara Salaway > > Melinda Altshuler
Matthew Satz > > Katie Grinnan
Bastienne Schmidt > > Jisoo Chung
Barry Schwabsky > > David Schafer
Christine Sciulli > > Karen Lofgren
Arlene Slavin > > Jenny Yurshansky
Janice Stanton > > Kearra Gopee
Christina Sun > > Catherine Scott
Carol Szymanski with David Adewomi  > > Xiouping (Whitworth)
Sara VanDerBeek > > Alicia Serling
Ryan Wallace > > Joshua Aster
Ross Watts > > Justine Harari
Allan Wexler > > Dan Kwong
Nina Yankowitz > > Francesca Gabbiani
Darius Yektai > > Barbara McCarren + Jud Fine
Almond Zigmund > > Marissa Mandler

Swept Away: “The Center Will Not Hold” II

By

My work, “The Center Will Not Hold” was  PERFORMED ON SITE AT THE ANNENBERG COMMUNITY BEACH HOUSE as part of:  Swept Way: Love Letters to a Surrogate, organized by
Warren Neidich, Christina Mossaides Strassfield, Anuradha Vikram and Rene Petropoulos  2022-23
“Swept Away: Love Letter to a Surrogate/s” is a community oriented artistic project that aims to create a transcontinental heartbeat across America. It is hoped that through its combined gestures and performances, a sense of solidarity, so desperately missing today, will emerge with which to confront the ecological catastrophe at our doorstep.”

65 Los Angeles County artists presented live performances over Earth Day Weekend: April 22 and 23, 2023 at the Santa Monica State Beach near the Annenberg Community Beach House on the Pacific Ocean. “The Center Will Not Hold” was one of them.

Videos from “The Center Will Not Hold” tell our story:  gathering the water, stitching the sand, healing the earth, even if The Center Does Not Hold.
Collaborators: Deborah Lynn Irmas and Frida Cano.

All Video Credits: Mick Lorusso April 2023

Our Work is Never Done on This Earth and in This Life

Swept Away: “The Center Will Not Hold” I

By

My work, “The Center Will Not Hold” was  PERFORMED ON SITE AT THE ANNENBERG COMMUNITY BEACH HOUSE as part of:  Swept Way: Love Letters to a Surrogate, organized by
Warren Neidich, Christina Mossaides Strassfield, Anuradha Vikram and Rene Petropoulos  2022-23
“Swept Away: Love Letter to a Surrogate/s” is a community oriented artistic project that aims to create a transcontinental heartbeat across America. It is hoped that through its combined gestures and performances, a sense of solidarity, so desperately missing today, will emerge with which to confront the ecological catastrophe at our doorstep.”

65 Los Angeles County artists presented live performances over Earth Day Weekend: April 22 and 23, 2023 at the Santa Monica State Beach near the Annenberg Community Beach House on the Pacific Ocean. “The Center Will Not Hold” was one of them.

Stills from “The Center Will Not Hold”: gathering the water, stitching the sand.
Collaborators: Deborah Lynn Irmas and Frida Cano.


Image Credit: Mick Lorusso April 2023    Three Women Gather Water Working Silently Together


Image Credit: Mick Lorusso April 2023   Carrying Water to the Blanket of the Four Directions


Image Credit: Mick Lorusso April 2023   Making Their Way to the Blanket of the Fuur Directions Site


Image Credit: Mick Lorusso April 2023   Water is Used to Dampen The Sand To Create Mounds


Image Credit: Mick Lorusso April 2023   Needles Threaded With Hemp Cord Are Used To Stitch 


Image Credit: Mick Lorusso April 2023      Through the Sand  Mounds Creating Lines of Connection


Image Credit: Mick Lorusso April 2023     Hemp Cords Are Threaded Across the Open Circle


Image Credit: Mick Lorusso April 2023     The Center Is Stitched as is the Sand Around the Blanket


Image Credit: Mick Lorusso April 2023     The Work of Mending is Completed for the Moment

Image Credit: Mick Lorusso April 2023     The Work is Never Done on This Earth and in This Life

More to come.

EXHIBITIONISTA: “Swept Away: Love Letter to a Surrogate(s)”

By

 

ON SITE: ANNENBERG COMMUNITY BEACH HOUSE

Annenberg – Swept Way: Love Letters to a Surrogate

Organized by

Warren Neidich, Christina Mossaides Strassfield, Anuradha Vikram and Rene Petropoulos  2022-23

“Swept Away: Love Letter to a Surrogate/s” is a community oriented artistic project that aims to create a transcontinental heartbeat across America. It is hoped that through its combined gestures and performances, a sense of solidarity, so desperately missing today, will emerge with which to confront the ecological catastrophe at our doorstep.”

65 Los Angeles County artists will present live performances over Earth Day Weekend: April 22 and 23, 2023 at the Santa Monica State Beach near the Annenberg Community Beach House on the Pacific Ocean.

I am thrilled to participate in:
Swept Away: Love Letter to a Surrogate(s), Main Beach, East Hampton, NY / Santa Monica Beach, Santa Monica, CA
Curators: Warren Neidich, Christina Mossaides Strassfield, Anuradha Vikram and Rene Petropoulos  2022-23

The syncopated sound of the surf will provide the background acousmatic. This poetic project in some ways harkens back to the Happenings staged by Allan Kaprow in 1966 all through the South Fork: https://alastairgordonwalltowall.com/2018/02/07/gas-i-am-a-happener-1966-east-hampton/

Artist Warren Neidich co- curated the successful Drive by Art event in 2020.
The “SWEPT AWAY” project is co-curated and co-coordinated by Christina Strassfield, Museum Director/Chief Curator of Guild Hall, Anuradha Vikram, Los Angeles based independent curator, and Los Angeles based conceptual artist Renee Petropoulos, plus administrative coordination by Julie McKim.

65 artists living in on the East End and 65 west coast artists are participating in this community and family-based Art Happening. In the spring the reverse will occur; with East End artists writing love letters to LA artists to be executed at Will Rogers State Beach, Santa Monica in conjunction with the 18th Street Arts Center.

Artists will create ephemeral performative gestures of immateriality or time-based works on the beach. This could be making a sandcastle, singing a song, reciting poetry, dancing, make a sculpture that interacts with the tide, collecting shells, doing a light projection,, picking up garbage on the beach, etc.  The works could be political and deal with global warming and its effects on the water level or could be apolitical and talk about the natural beauty of the real in opposition to the digital and virtual.

The importance of biodegradable, non-toxic materials will be essential as well as leaving the beach pristine after the work.

Each East Coast artist has been linked up to a West Coast artist who will email instructions – a love letter – for a work of art that the local artist will incorporate into their performative piece, acting as a surrogate. In the Spring will occur the reverse, with East Coast Artists sending Love Letters to their West Coast counterparts, who will use it as a springboard to create offerings to happewn at Santa Monica’s Will Rogers State Beach.

The list of East End and West Coast artist pairings is as follows:

EAST END ARTISTS  > LOS ANGELES ARTISTS
Pamella Allen > Jade Gordon + Megan Whitmarsh
Suzanne Anker > Margarethe Drexel
Elena Bajo  > Jasmine Orpilla
Lillian Ball > Dana Duff
Monica Banks > Jamie Ross
Dianne Blell > Lisa Anne Auerbach
Scott Bluedorn > Robby Herbst
Sanford Biggers > Sterling Wells
Megan Chaskey > Lionel Popkin
Scott Chaskey > Kathryn Andrews
Philippe Cheng > David Horvitz
Andrea Cote > Nina Waisman
Ivana Dama > Rodrigo Arruda
Peter Dayton > Anita Pace
Katrina Del Mar > Taisha Paggett + Meital Yaniv
Jeremy Dennis > Debra Disman
Sabra Moon Elliot > Rochelle Fabb
Carol Edwards > Pamela Hudson
Eva Faye > Patty Chang + David Kelly
Saskia Friedrich > Fran Siegel
Margaret Garrett > Susan Kleinberg
Veronica Gonzales > Cassandra Marketo
Kimberly Goff > Cheri Gaulke + Xochi Maberry-Gaulke
Jeremy Grosvenor > Vincent Johnson
Jerelyn Hanrahan > Andrew Berardini
Candace Hill Montgomery > Anna Joy Springer
Virva Hinnemo > Sam Shoemaker
Alice Hope > Krysten Cunningham
Erica-Lynn Huberty > Sandeep Mukherjee
Terri Hyland > Joseph Mosconi
Ruby Jackson > Alice Könitz
Ilya + Emelia Kabakov > Carolyn Castano
Carlos Lama > Elisabeth Houston
Laurie Lambrecht > May Sun
Joseph Liatela > Badly Licked Bear
Donald Lipski > Raul Baltazar
Sutton Lynch > Yrneh Gabon Brown
Josephine Meckseper > Jiayun Chen
Paul Miller > Lucia Santini Ribisi
Tanya Minhas > Allison Wyper
Richard Mothes > Kristin Calabrese
Michelle Murphy > Sarah Beadle
Jill Musnicki > Victoria Vesna
Eileen O’Kane Kornreich > Iman Person
Dalton Portella > Ryat Yezbick
Jaanika Peerna > Marcus Kuiland Nazario
Toni Ross > Sharon Barnes
David Rothenberg > Beatriz Cortez
Will Ryan > Jody Zellen
Sara Salaway > Melinda Altshuler
Matthew Satz > Katie Grinnan
Bastienne Schmidt > Jisoo Chung
Barry Schwabsky > David Schafer
Christine Sciulli > Karen Lofgren
Arlene Slavin > Jenny Yurshansky
Janice Stanton > Kearra Gopee
Christina Sun > Catherine Scott
Carol Szymanski  > Xiouping
Sara VanDerBeek > Alicia Serling
Ryan Wallace > Joshua Aster
Ross Watts > Justine Harari
Allan Wexler > Dan Kwong
Nina Yankowitz > Francesca Gabbiani
Darius Yektai > Barbara McCarren + Jud Fine
Almond Zigmund > Marissa Mandler


ABOUT WARREN NEIDICH

Warren Neidich uses written texts and neon-light sculptures to create cross-pollinating conceptual works that reflect upon situations at the border zones of art, science, and social justice. His performative and sculptural work Pizzagate Neon (2018), recently on display at the Venice Biennale 2019, analyzed, through a large hanging neon light sculpture, fake news and the post-truth society. Selected exhibitions include the Whitney Museum of American Art, PS1 MOMA, White Columns, Walker Art Center MIT List Visual Art Center, (Cambridge), Los Angeles County Museum of Art, National Museum of American Art (Washington D.C., US), Museum Ludwig (Köln, Germany), Haus Der Kunst (Munich), Zentrum für Kunst and Media (Karlsruhe, Germany), ICA London, Palais Tokyo (Paris, France), Villa Arson (Nice, France) and Kunsthaus Zürich. He has been a visiting lecturer in the Departments of Art at Brown University, GSD Harvard University, Columbia University, Princeton University, University of California, Los Angeles, the Sorbonne in Paris, France; and the University of Oxford and Cambridge University in the UK. His work has been the subject of over 150 magazine and newspaper articles, including The New York Times, Time Magazine, Artforum, Art in America, Kunstforum International, The Art Newspaper, Smithsonian Magazine, The Chicago Tribune, Hyperallergic, Artnet, GQ, Forbes, Vogue IT, Monopol, Performance Art Journal, , Time Out, The New Yorker, New York Magazine, Los Angeles Times, The Village Voice, and Frieze.