The Weekend:Dec 2-4.

FRIDAY:

TED BROOKLYN:
We’re living in what is commonly referred to as the “Information Age.” With the emergence of social networks, we build new communities by pressing the “Like” and “+1” buttons and becoming fans. As we become increasingly interconnected with the Brooklyn community in these new ways, we find ourselves grasping for a new common ethos. In other words, we are striving to refine and define “better.” On December 2 at Brooklyn Bowl, we will address these issues with talks from the best and brightest minds of Brooklyn and beyond.

OPERA ON TAP/Roulette Sisters.
Opera is fun. Most people don’t seem to realize how much fun it really is. In order to prove it, Opera on Tap has taken its act to barrooms where they found out that beer on tap enhances the operatic experience. The company is made up of young singers and instrumentalists who relish the direct contact with audiences not inhibited in their reactions by the looming menace of giant chandelier.The Roulette Sisters have been turning heads and stopping traffic since forming in the cold winter of 2003. Noticing that their warm velvet harmonies and spicy hot licks were melting the snow outside, the sisters realized that they had started something not only weather-altering but soul-stirring as well. The sexy sisters play a hip-shaking blend of American country blues, traditional songs, popular tunes and old timey music from the first half of the 20th century. With Mamie Minch: resonator guitar, Meg Reichardt: electric guitar, Megan Burleyson: washboard, Karen Waltuch: viola.

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THE WEEK: NOV 1-4.

TUESDAY:

PERFORMA 11 (ONGOING)
Performa 11, the fourth edition of the internationally acclaimed biennial of new visual art performance presented by Performa, will be held in New York City from November 1–21, 2011. The three-week biennial will showcase new work by more than 100 of the most exciting artists working today, in an innovative program breaking down the boundaries between visual art, music, dance, poetry, fashion, architecture, graphic design, and the culinary arts. Presented in collaboration with a consortium of more than 50 arts institutions and over 50 curators, as well as a network of public spaces and private venues across the city, Performa 11 will ignite New York City with energy and ideas, acting as a vital “think tank” linking minds across the five boroughs and bringing audiences together for brilliant new performances in all disciplines.

Ben Gerstein (Jerome Foundation Commission) – FREEDOM CHOIR! A congregation for cathartic improvisational service
On November 1st, All Saints’ Day, The Day of the Dead — ancient holidays in honor of the saints, known or unknown; deceased friends and family — Ben Gerstein brings together for the first time a unique ensemble of enormous acoustic, experiential intensity to celebrate the powers of improvisation on this earth. FREEDOM CHOIR! A congregation for cathartic improvisational service. Inspired by the micro and macrocosms of nature, ecstatic spiritual and athletic experiences, dream, destiny, ritual, prayer, ancestry, and visions throughout Art and beyond… Dance floor, prairie, pow-wow, synagogue, church, mountain top, ocean, forest, desert, track and field, fighting ring, mosh pit … Ferocious love! A historic event for expansive sound and emotion; unnamable sound, unnamable emotion. We are the world! Communion between us all…

69°S. (Part of the 2011 Next Wave Festival)
“When I look back at those days, I have no doubt that divine providence guided us… it seemed to me often that we were not alone.” —Sir Ernest Henry ShackletonSixty-nine degrees south latitude, threshold of Antarctica, foreboding and cold. In an attempt to cross the continent, explorer Ernest Shackleton and crew have been shipwrecked, and now—through the work of Phantom Limb marionette maker and composer Erik Sanko and set designer Jessica Grindstaff (both at BAM with More Than Four, 2007 Next Wave)—they emerge before us in the snow.

CHAMBER MUSIC at INCUBATOR ARTS PROJECT
Robert Ashley’s music has long been recognized as some of the most radical, forward-thinking work produced today. The Incubator Arts Project’s MUSIC series, curated by Travis Just, focuses on his chamber and instrumental music, in addition to re-thinking one of his best-known vocal epics: Automatic Writing. A new generation of experimental composers and artists is looking to Ashley’s work for inspiration; this week will show why.(ONGOING)

PHARMA
The Herb Lubalin Study Center at The Cooper Union examines the influence and impact of graphic design on the pharmaceutical industry in PHARMA, a new exhibit featuring original and rarely seen works by luminaries including Andy Warhol, Lester Beall, Will Burtin and Herb Lubalin. PHARMA’s exploration begins with the avant-garde promotionals of the 1940’s, when a market need emerged to promote “miracle” drugs, such as Penicillin, to the medical industry. In a compelling and thought-provoking way, PHARMA presents the relationship graphic design has had with the pharmaceutical industry ranging from the federal government’s increased regulations to new marketing tactics where the everyday consumer, not the doctor, is considered the target audience. While the exhibition provides examples of past and present, the public is encouraged to reflect and question how graphic design is used to market drugs and design has transformed these commodities into objects of desire.

Spartacus Chetwynd: The Lion Tamer
7th Annual Alternative Processes Winners: Barbara Ciurej & Lindsay Lochman 
UMBERTO ECO in conversation with Paul
Tod Lippy: The Conception and Development of ESOPUS
Holdengraber
Migratory Media: A Film Event
Counterfactual: Muybridge’s Debt to Watkins
Tom Brokaw in Conversation with Paul Holdengräber
BROOKLYN REAL ESTATE ROUNDTABLE
OSCAR PEÑAS
Enid Ellen at Piano’s
Tomorrow Land/Collaspe
Barbara Siegel, Arboretum/Privacy Please! Jan Johnson
Influential Friends
Matthew Stone: Optimism as Cultural Rebellion
ARAB SPRINGS/ ATLANTIC WEALTH: TRADING ROOM
Serenity Now!
BRADFORD NORDEEN WITH GARY INDIANA
Playing with Form
CAP/ICP – Artist Lecture: Joni Sternbach – Surfland
365 Drawings
panel discussion | residency as refuge?
GLOBAL ISSUES IN DESIGN AND VISUALITY IN THE 21ST CENTURY: CULTURE – FASHION HACKING
ROXANE BUTTERFLY
Mur Murs

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