ABOUT

Transfix at Imperial Dunes, CA. 2010. Photograph by Chris Loomis.

 VESSEL ARTISTS
                 
Rachel Bowditch (Artistic Director) MA/Ph.D. is a performer, theatre director, performance studies scholar, and an assistant professor in the School of Theatre and Film in the Herberger Institute of Design and the Arts at Arizona State University. As the artistic director of Vessel, she has presented original work at Here Performing Arts Center, the American Living Room Festival, the Ontological-Hysteric Downstairs Series, the Philadelphia Live Arts/Fringe Festival, the New York International Independent Film Festival at Madison Square Garden, the GenArt Summer Arts Festival, the New York International Fringe Festival, The Kitchen, Phoenix Fringe Festival, the Mesa Contemporary Arts Center, Scottsdale Museum of Modern Art, Taliesin West Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, and Scottsdale Public Art among other venues. Her innovative use of multi-media in Sophie Treadwell’s Machinal and her original work The Ophelia Project have been depicted in Live Design (October 2008) and American Theatre (January  2009).  A complete profile of her artistic and scholarly work can be seen at www.rachelbowditch.com. Her book On the Edge of Utopia: Performance and Ritual at Burning Man was published by Seagull Books/University of Chicago Press in 2010 as part of the Enactments Series.

       
Lea Bender is a founding member of Vessel whose work with Rachel Bowditch dates back to their collaborations in 1996 on The Theater of Madness, and the original performance of Transfix.  Her background in performance has ranged from avant-garde theater to indie film (www.verticalpool.com/vision.html) to circus (fire, stilts, trapeze).   She based in NYC where she studies and performs on static trapeze (www.natalieagee.com/rubystreak/index.html) and creates site-specific street games for a living (www.thegogame.com). Lea is currently at work on a memoir about the months she spent with a community of spirit mediums in Ghana.   Her play on the subject entitled Second Sight has been performed in San Francisco, Philadelphia and New York (www.vesselproject.org/secondsight.html). 

Jeff Grow (Magician/Performer) is a founding member of Vessel.

RECENT COLLABORATORS

Chris Loomis (Photography) holds a BFA in photography from the University of North Texas and the Brooks Institute of Photography. After a gig in LA as a photographer for Seiniger Advertising, he moved to Arizona to start a business as a freelance commercial/editorial photographer. He has shot for numerous publications as well as many clients in the area and abroad. Along with his commercial work, he strives to elevate and blend his love of fashion and fine art (photography) with science fiction (film), surrealism/pop-surrealism, film-making and music. www.chrisloomis.com

       
Saskia Jorda ('Escaping White' Ladder Installation) is an interdisciplinary artist working on site-specific installations, drawings, and performances. Scientific research has been a departure point for Jorda’s work since the time of her undergraduate studies at Arizona State University. This exploration developed further in the work she did for her Master’s degree at the School of Visual Arts in New York City. Since then, her work has referenced obscure anatomy, the evolution of a second skin, and the body as an alternate artifact.  Saskia has been a resident artist and the Director of the Taliesin Artist Residency Program at Taliesin since 2005. www.saskiajorda.com

Simon De Aguero (Tensile Fabric Installation) attended the University of Colorado in Boulder and received a BFA in Fine Art. He then worked at the Santa Fe Art Institute as the Education Outreach Coordinator and assisted in art installation. He is a graduate in Architecture from Taliesin West, Frank Lloyd Wright School of Architecture.

Verbobala (verbo-bala "bullet verb") is a multimedia performance collective based out of Mexico City and Tucson, Arizona. Using remix as creative process, the group bends diverse media and genres into performance art, installation and dance parties. Political and linguistic borders are meant to be crossed. www.verbobala.com

Adam Cooper-Terán (Verbobala) is an autodidactic multimedia artist from Tucson, Arizona, better known for his video installations and performances with various groups based in the Southwest and Mexico. When he’s not touring with the internationally acclaimed Verbobala Spoken Video, Adam builds video altars and conducts experiments in psychic portraiture. For more information visit www.antral.net.
               
Logan Phillips (Verbobala) is a bilingual writer and performer born and raised in the Arizona / Mexico borderlands. Both solo and as part of the international collective Verbobala, Logan has toured across the US and into France, Colombia, England and Mexico. More can be found at www.dirtyverbs.com.
              
                                                  (Left) Photo by Adam Cooper-Terán.  (Right) Photo by Alex Oliszewski.

Glenn Weyant (SonicAnta/Sound Sculpture) is a sound-sculptor/ journalist/ educator/ baker/ instrument designer/ welder based in Tucson, Arizona. Since 2006, Weyant has been playing the US/Mexico border walls, fences, assorted flotsam/jetsam and infrastructure with a cello bow and implements of mass percussion as part of The Anta Project. Further details can be found at: www.sonicanta.com
 
                   (Left) Glenn Weyant at Monorchid, April 2010 and (right) Glenn Weyant recording sounds of Gleeson Mine, October 2010.

Tedy Isaacks (Lighting Designer) has a BA in Theatre from ASU in the Design and Production Concentration. She recently designed Between at Valley Youth Theatre and Pippin for MCC Musical Theatre Department. She has designed the lights for Tragedy: a tragedy, The Ophelia Project, Transfix Retrospective at Monorchid, Don Coyote, Frame by Frame, Oedipus Rex, and The Highest Heaven. 

   
                                                                                                     Photo by Saskia Jorda.

Alexander Oliszewski (Imperial Dunes Video) is an MFA student at ASU in the Interdisciplinary Digital Media and Theatre program as a designer, performer, and video technician. He has written, produced, and performed four original works of performance cinema: Atra, Penumbra, Oblivion, and The Sand Queen Ceremonies. Professionally, he has worked throughout Colorado for: The Denver Center Reparatory Theatre, Shadow Theatre, Curious Theatre, LIDA Project, University of Denver’s Gates Performance Hall, and Durango Community Concert Hall.

ASSOCIATED ARTISTS AND PERFORMERS
Matt Watkins, Abraham Ntonya, Katie Kotulak, Grace Rolland, David Starry, Kristina Serna, Drew Ignatowski, Jamie Sandomire, Laine Nelson, Aaron Wester, Anne Wareing, Philip Zisman, Stacey Sotosky, Nicholas Broderick, Erica Majtenyi, Kerry Wieder, Elizabeth Widmer, Katie May, Monique Massiah, Kelsi Zahl, Kate Kugler, Portia Beacham, Kate Kugler, Cassidy Rogers, Jessica Mumford, Stjepan Rothko, Jody James, Nina Watt, Courtenay Cholovich, Sara Schwabe, Kathleya Afanador, Brittany Roa, Brent Davis, Natalie Schmidt, Valerie Vassilas, Sentell Harper, Maria Enriquez, Jenea Sanchez,  Kyle Wills, Jami Haas, Michael Thompson, Laura Miner, Renetto-Mario Etsitty, Gibran Villalobos, Jim Cavera, Katie Cochran, Donna Blumenfeld, Ben Overbough, Nayla Altamirano, Jessica Weaver, Adam Pinti, Joya Scott, Josh Matthews, Sarah Kozinn, Jenny Sargent, Timothy Speed Levitch, Tanya Calamoneri, Serene Zloof, Ximena Garnica, Gregory Frumin, Zack Mannheimer and the Subjective Theatre Company, Brian Corr, Paola Solomon, Bertie Ferdman, Kristin Haynes, Nikki Verhoff, Tracey Raven Dawn, Alexis Ryan, Rich Szpigel, Matthew Hamm, Sebastian White, Hannah Cabell, Micole Raab, Kara Hatch, Bruce Bowditch, Stephen Brady, David Brandt, Ferenz, Perchick Miller, Susan Riskin, Rick McKay, Square Square, John Ivory, Kelly Bucala, Liz Pink, Cypher Zero, Gillian Chadsey, Chacha Sikes, Suzi Takahashi, John Tzelepis, Caitlyn Conlin, David McCormick, Cathan Bordyn, Alex Smith and many others.

PHOTOGRAPHERS
Jean Esquivel, Nicolas Goldberg, Bill Durgin, John Tzelepis, Liz Pink, Chris Loomis, Saskia Jorda, and Alex Oliszewski, Bruce Bowditch, and Ron Nachtwey.