Category Archive: 2016 In Dialogue Main Stage Events

In Dialogue Events: Bright Half Life


Saturday, October 29th:
Opening Night Reception | Post-Show
Join us immediately following the performance for nibbles, drinks and music.
Morrison Lobby

Sunday, October 30th:
Mat Chat* with Bright Half Life director Rebecca Lingafelter | Post-show

Wednesday, November 2nd:
Mat Chat* with the Cast of Bright Half Life | Post-show

Thursday, November 3rd:
Metropolitan Learning Center Student Presentation | 6:55pm
Quiara Alegría Hudes’ dynamic play Water By the Spoonful touches on many human themes, from grief and family to addiction and redemption. Students in the Theatre Arts class at MLC (Tanya Barfield’s alma mater and a Profile education partner for 15 years) have explored this play and created original stories, in their own words, about how these things came into the world. The students will present a sampling of these stories in a short performance.
Morrison Lobby

Friday, November 4th:
Julie Jeske, LPC: Love, Intimacy and Desire in Long Term Relationships | 6:55pm
Julie Jeske, LPC is a sex and relationship counselor. She has a private practice where she helps people feel more passion, pleasure and joy in their lives and in their relationships. She teaches the Human Sexuality class for the Graduate Program in Counseling at Portland State University. She is a frequent contributor for online articles, magazine articles and TV segments. She also offers online classes in sexuality, self-love and intimacy. You can learn more about her practice at www.juliejeske.com
(ASL Interpreted)
Morrison Lobby

Saturday, November 5th:
Lauren Bloom Hanover: Looking Back on a Year of Tanya Barfield | 6:55pm
Interim Artistic Director Lauren Bloom Hanover discusses what it has been like to spend a year with Tanya Barfield and her plays.  She will explore how Bright Half Life embodies many of the themes that are central to Tanya’s unique artistic voice, and how the piece fits into the greater context of Tanya’s body of work.

Sunday, November 6th:
Mat Chat* with the Cast of Bright Half Life | Post-show

Wednesday, November 9th:
Miranda Hardy: Designing the Lights for Bright Half Life | 6:55pm
Miranda is a Lighting Designer based in Portland.  Previously with Profile she lit Master Harold and the Boys.  She is an associate company member with PETE (Portland Experimental Theater Ensemble) designing lights for R3 [Drammy Award], The Three Sisters, All Well, or, the whale, and Procedures For Saying No, designing scenery and lights for Song of the Dodo and Drowned Horse Tavern.  Miranda has worked extensively in New York City, as well as nationally and internationally including four seasons as the resident Lighting Designer at Festival Di Due Mondi (Spoleto, IT).  Miranda holds an MFA from the California Institute of the Arts.
Morrison Lobby

Thursday, November 10th:
Professor Ian O’Loughlin: The Science of Memory | 6:55pm
The sciences of memory have recently demonstrated that our pasts are constructed through remembering, that memory is an essentially generative process.  We construct these narratives of our lived pasts through the lens of the present, but we also experience the present as a function of our pasts.  Although this interdependence among temporal modes may seem paradoxical, it is resolved through the plasticity of our stories and storytelling: as persons, our selves are fundamentally narrative, and these narratives are always in development, and are always already being worked and reworked, both by us and by those close to us.
Ian O’Loughlin earned his Ph.D. in the philosophy of cognitive science at the University of Iowa, and is now a faculty member in the philosophy department at Pacific University, where he teaches classes on the philosophy of mind, the philosophy of science, language and logic, and artificial intelligence.  He has presented and published work on the cognitive science of memory, learning and education, self-knowledge, and implicit bias.
Morrison Lobby

Friday, November 11th:
Joli St. Patrick, Spoken Word Artist:Unchosen Family  | 6:55pm
Who are we? Who gets to define us? Is it ever too late to start from scratch? Can the traumatized form functional community without reenacting our own abuse? Through a series of spoken word pieces interspersed with informal narrative, Joli explores what it means to reform the self outside the coercive definitions of social convention.
Joli St. Patrick is a queer slam poet, parent, demigirl and witch. She can be found in Portland, OR missing buses, kissing cuties, healing trauma, and unpacking her trans experience through writing and performance. In 2014 she self-published her first chapbook, Learning Curves, and her writing has been featured in The Body is Not an Apology, Voicemail Poems, the anthology Poems for the Queer Revolution, and her own channel Gently Press Poetry on Soundcloud and Youtube.
Morrison Lobby

Saturday, November 12th:
Angela Davise | 6:55pm
We are welcoming Ms. Davise back, after her wonderful pre-show performance during Antigone Project.  She will be singing songs of love gained, love lost and love hoped for.  Having gone through many cracks and valleys with her quest for love in her own life, she has healed many of the pains associated with that quest through songwriting, all of which has allowed her to truly understand herself and her needs in a love relationship, not settling to suffer for a counterfeit affair.
Angela Davise, Georgia born,  California Grown,  Portland Grounded, started her journey with musical expression several years ago.  From the time she was a child she searched for outlets to release the emotional depth of her heart through the expression of, poetry, art, and dance.
Morrison Lobby

(*): The Mat Chats for Bright Half Life are dedicated to the memory of Profile’s former Board Treasurer, Mayer Schwartz.  More information coming soon on Mayer, his service and where donations can be made in his memory.

 

In Dialogue Events: Antigone Project

Profile Theatre is proud to be partnering with Blacque Butterfly Presents on the In Dialogue Main Stage events for The Antigone Project: A Play in Five Parts.  We have collaborated to feature a series of local spoken-word artists performing in our lobby prior to each performance of the production.  Mirroring the collection of diverse voices embodied in Antigone Project, the artists are from varied backgrounds, experiences and perspectives, all of which come to bear on the profound and provocative  work that they will be sharing with our audiences.

To find out more about Antigone Project, click here.
To see past In Dialogue Events, click here.

Wednesday, September 7th:
Angela Davise | 6:55pm

Thursday, September 8th:
ShaRhonda McCauley | 6:55pm

Friday, September 9th:
Nafisaria Scroggins-thomas  and Akela Jaffi | 6:55pm

Saturday, September 10th Matinee:
GG Warren and Anayla Warren-Premsingh** | 1:25pm

Saturday, September 10th Evening:
Habiba Addo | 6:55pm

Sunday, September 11th:
Wilma Alcock and Blacque Butterfly** | 1:25pm

(**): Mother-Daughter Pairing

Additionally, as part of our year-long collaboration with Geezer Gallery, we will be displaying the work of Farooq Hassan in our lobby for the duration of this production.  Mr. Hassan’s varied exploration of the female form and the female psyche reflect the versatility of expression embodied in The Antigone Project.

Artist Bios:

Habiba Addo is a native of Ghana, West Africa.  She holds a degree in Theater and a Certificate of Dance from Portland State University.  She has performed and taught in the United States and internationally for over fifteen years.  She teaches and performs dance, rhythm and stories from Ghana, Guinea, Gambia and Senegal.  She also shares the rich African cultures present today in Cuba and Brazil. A guest teacher and performer for Portland Public Schools for over fifteen years, Habiba has also performed and taught the community in dance, storytelling and theater through organizations such as Young Audiences, White Bird, Oregon Ballet Theater, Interstate Firehouse Cultural Center, Tygres Heart Shakespeare Company, Mambo Queens, Northwest Afrikan American Ballet, Montessori Schools, Cedarwood Woldorf School, Oregon Episcopal School, Miracle Theater, Milagro Bailadores and Portland State University’s World Dance Office. She is a recipient of the Lila Jewel award (2000), an Arts Alive grant (2000) and multiple technical assistant grants from Regional Arts and Culture Council (1998, 2002 and 2012).

Wilma Alcock – Wilma has written poetry as a Write around Portland participant and spokesperson.  She was also  featured in Give!Guide and the voice of the Portland Harbor River clean project and she is also a freedom writer.

Akela Auer “Akela Jaffi” is a Portland native. She has been performing since she was small because it’s in her bloodline and because she knows nothing else. While her craft is made up of many different mediums, dance has been her main boo for over a decade. She recognizes the power movement has to open up the darkest doors of the self and inspire others to seek within for guidance. She intends to always dance as a form of prayer and healing.

Darlene Solomon “Blacque Butterfly – Blacque Butterfly is an entertainer. Her love for the arts has allowed her to explore several layers of her calling. Be it spoken word, motivational speaking, singing, dancing, theater or event promoting she has allowed the Creator to use her ministry to inspire others to follow their calling. Darlene is a native Oregonian, born and raised in NE Portland she has released and published a chapbook entitled “Black girl can I comb your hair” and a spoken word CD entitled Collide -A – Scope (Where life, love and grace collide.) She is currently in the studio working on her sophomore project. She is featured on a variety of collaborative projects.

Angela Davise, Georgia born,  California Grown,  Portland Grounded, started her journey with musical expression several years ago.  From the time she was a child she searched for outlets to release the emotional depth of her heart through the expression of, poetry, art, and dance. The music of Angela Davise evokes an emotional response to the deepest of secret cries within the heart.  The total abandonment to the world of listeners to be completely transparent in songwriting paints a very clear picture of struggle and survival, sadness and joy, defeat overcome by victorious cries of an unrelenting hope.

Farooq Hassan spent his youth in crowded cafes and on the docks in Iraq, striving to capture on paper the colorful scenes playing out before his eyes. As a young man, he taught high school. “We did our best to create art, not politics,” Hassan recalls. For 50 years he built his standing as an artist. His work was exhibited in London, Amman, Basrah, and Baghdad. In Iraq, he was considered a national treasure.

Then, politics changed his life forever. Between 1980 and 1991 Hassan moved 22 times, always one step ahead of political strife in Bagdad. Life in Iraq was especially perilous. In 2010, Hassan and his wife, Haifa, joined their daughter in Portland. Hassan was 71 years old and he had lost everything: his reputation as a master artist, the paintings he had created in Iraq, and his home. So, he set about renewing himself through painting.

ShaRhonda “Rose City MissChief” McCauley is a spoken word and hip-hop performance and recording artist.  The rapoet most recently self-published and released her first anthology of poetry called Rhyme Scheme:  Power Edition Volume 1.  The Portland, OR native has performed at many community events, schools, and local concerts as a soloist and as a group as one of the original members of the hip-hop trio Rose Bent.  She recorded two projects with the group and also a limited play spoken word album and mixtape as a soloist.  She has collaborated with many other local talents and has had opportunities to showcase her talents in other regions as well.

Sherrie Warren “GG Warren”GG Warren is a writer, photographer, bass player, jewelry designer, licensed massage therapist, and proud mother. Her writing stems from emotions, and situations she has personally experienced, or what she would like to experience. Love, loss, tragedy, loneliness, triumph, and undefinable happiness are all her inspirations.

Anayla Warren-Premsingh – Anayla Warren-Premsingh is 18 years old and just graduated from Jefferson high school. She will be attending the University of Oregon in the fall. Her major is undeclared, but she’s looking into getting into international studies and minoring business, or possibly, majoring in human physiology. She started writing “creatively” when she could string words together in a sentence on a piece of paper. She writes poetry and short (and maybe one day) long, stories.

 

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In Dialogue Events: Blue Door

Saturday, April 9th:
Opening Night Reception | Post-Show
Join us immediately following the performance for nibbles, drinks and music.
Alder Lobby

Sunday, April 10th:
Mat Chat with Blue Door director Bobby Bermea | Post-show

Monday, April 11th:
In Dialogue Community Event – Blues People: A Journey Through African American Music | 7:30pm
Join us on the set of our second production of the season Blue Door, for an incredible night of musical exploration.  Experience the versatility, depth, energy and vibrancy of African American music – traditions that are at the heart of American culture – as they are explored by local music luminaries The Obo Addy Legacy Project, LaRhonda Steele, Adrian Baxter, Carmen Brantley Payne and Mic Capes! Click here to reserve your tickets.
Alder Stage

Wednesday, April 13th:
Mat Chat with the Cast of Blue Door | Post-show

Thursday, April 14th:
Ruth Nardecchia, Lighting Designer | 7:00pm
Get behind-the-scenes insight into designer Ruth Nardecchia process of using light to create the world of Blue Door, and how it has differed from the challenges of creating the naturalistic environments for The Call.
Mid Level Mezzanine

Friday, April 15th:
Dr. Anoop Mirpuri, Racial Haunting in an Age of Black Ascension | 7:00pm
Since the 1980s, the ascension of black people within the professional classes, rather than indicating real progress in the fight for equality, has instead presented a major obstacle for working class and anti-racist struggles against economic and social inequalities that in fact seem to be widening. This presentation explores how black art and performance has both purposefully and unwittingly negotiated this problem that has become a defining feature of social and cultural life in America.
Anoop Mirpuri is Assistant Professor of English and affiliate faculty in Black Studies at Portland State University. He teaches and writes about African American literature, the black radical tradition, and the relation between race, capitalism, and criminalization.
Mid Level Mezzanine
ASL Interpreted

Saturday, April 16th:
Eve Crane, Photojournalist | 7:00pm
Ms. Crane will share stories of being embedded with the Black Panthers in Oakland in the 60’s, what life was like and how she captured the amazing images seen throughout the lobby and mezzanine. As part of Profile’s year long collaboration with Geezer Gallery, Ms. Crane’s work will be on display in the lobby for the entire run of Blue Door.
Mid Level Mezzanine

Sunday, April 17th:
Mat Chat with the cast of Blue Door | Post-Show

Wednesday, April 20th:
Metropolitan Learning Center Student Presentation | 7:00pm
Students from MLC (our playwright’s alma mater and a Profile education partner for 15 years) will present scenes and monologues from the work the are creating, inspired by Tanya Barfield and the myth of Antigone.
Alder Lobby

Thursday, April 21st:
Chetter Galloway, Breaking Bread with Stories | 7:00pm
Experience the art and technique of African American storytelling with Master Storyteller Chetter M. Galloway.  Chetter will take listeners on a journey from Africa to the Americas with tales of courage, wisdom, and inspiration. Join him as he engages listeners with the African oral tradition while embodying the spirit and soul of black storytelling.
Chetter Galloway is a storyteller who specializes in African and African-American stories. Chetter, a native of Suffolk, VA is the youngest of ten children and remembers his father telling stories on road trips. He first experienced the power of storytelling at the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation in Williamsburg, VA. He honed his craft at East Tennessee State University in their Masters of Storytelling Program.  Chetter’s joy for story has enabled him to perform as both a living historian and storyteller throughout the United States.  Chetter is a member of the National Association of Black Storytellers, National Storytelling Network, and the Portland Storytellers Guild.
Alder Lobby

Friday, April 22nd:
Habiba Addo, Ancestors Duet | 7:00pm
Join teaching and performance artist Habiba Addo in an evocation for our ancestors through voice, movement and storytelling.  Habiba’s mission in her life and in her work is the fostering healthy communities everywhere through play, curiosity, mistakes, collaboration and respect.  www.habibasvillage.com
Alder Lobby

Saturday, April 23rd:
Dr. Anoop Mirpuri, Racial Haunting in an Age of Black Ascension | 7:00pm
Since the 1980s, the ascension of black people within the professional classes, rather than indicating real progress in the fight for equality, has instead presented a major obstacle for working class and anti-racist struggles against economic and social inequalities that in fact seem to be widening. This presentation explores how black art and performance has both purposefully and unwittingly negotiated this problem that has become a defining feature of social and cultural life in America.
Anoop Mirpuri is Assistant Professor of English and affiliate faculty in Black Studies at Portland State University. He teaches and writes about African American literature, the black radical tradition, and the relation between race, capitalism, and criminalization.
Mid Level Mezzanine

For tickets to Blue Door, go here.

To see past In Dialogue Events, go here.

In Dialogue Events: The Call

 

Saturday, February 6th:
Conversation with Tanya Barfield & Interim Artistic Director Lauren Hanover | Pre-Show
Opening Night Reception | Post-Show
Join us immediately following the performance for nibbles, drinks and music.
Morrison Lobby

Sunday, February 7th:
Mat Chat with playwright Tanya Barfield and director Gemma Whelan | Post-show

Wednesday, February 10th:
Mat Chat with the Cast of The Call | Post-show

Wednesday, February 10th:
In Dialogue Community Event:
“From Saving to Serving” Conversation Project | 7:30 pm
Profile is thrilled to partner again with Oregon Humanities to examine issues that lie at the heart of the first production of our season, Tanya Barfield’s The Call.  Join Oregon Humanities Executive Director Adam Davis for a conversation that will explore why it’s so hard to find the right words for the good work we try to do in the world. How should we think and talk about our efforts to make positive change?
Morrison Stage
Reserve Tickets here

Thursday, February 11th:
Melissa Masserant: Kids in Your Neighborhood Need Your Help | 6:50pm
Most people are not aware of the foster care crisis currently happening in Multnomah County and across the state.  Learn more about the needs these children have and the various ways you can partner with DHS to help support them. Ms. Masserant is a Foster/Adopt/Relative Parent Trainer with the Department of Human Services (Child Welfare) in Multnomah County.  She has worked with children and families for over 26 years and has been with DHS since 2001.  She earned her Bachelor’s of Science degree in Human Development and Family Studies from Colorado State University.
Morrison Lobby

Friday, February 12th:
Metropolitan Learning Center Student Presentation| 6:50pm
Students from MLC (a Profile education partner for 15 years and our playwright’s alma mater) will present scenes and monologues from the work of Tanya Barfield.
Morrison Lobby

Saturday, February 13th:
Paula Benjaminson: Experiencing Life in Africa Through Art | 6:50pm
Ms. Benjaminson is a former diplomat who has crossed over into the world of fiber art. Her posting in Namibia introduced her to the hand-carved wood printing blocks of Oshiwa Designs, and she specializes in making textile art pieces with her hand-stamped fabrics for the past several years. As part of Profile’s year long collaboration with Geezer Gallery, Ms. Benjaminson’s work will be on display in the lobby for the entire run of The Call.
Morrison Lobby

Sunday, February 14th:
Mat Chat with The Call cast | Post-Show

Wednesday, February 17th:
Gordon Lee, Pianist | 6:50pm
Join us for a short program of live jazz piano performance by Gordon Lee, noted Northwest composer, jazz pianist, arranger, conductor and music educator.

Thursday, February 18th:
Melissa Masserant: Kids in Your Neighborhood Need Your Help | 6:50pm
Most people are not aware of the foster care crisis currently happening in Multnomah County and across the state.  Learn more about the needs these children have and the various ways you can partner with DHS to help support them. Ms. Masserant is a Foster/Adopt/Relative Parent Trainer with the Department of Human Services (Child Welfare) in Multnomah County.  She has worked with children and families for over 26 years and has been with DHS since 2001.  She earned her Bachelor’s of Science degree in Human Development and Family Studies from Colorado State University.
Morrison Lobby

Friday, February 19th:
Professor Kundai Chirindo: Staging Africa | 6:50pm
Many people take the meanings and relevance of the ideas for which the term ‘Africa’ stands for granted. This short presentation will argue that such simplifications of African experiences and ideas of Africa are reductive, and are, in fact, “stagings”; each time they are confirmed, contested, or denied, whatever ideas we have of Africa constitute Africa for us. Kundai Chirindo is an Assistant Professor in the Rhetoric & Media Studies Department at Lewis & Clark College. His teaching experience covers courses in two primary areas; ethnic studies and rhetoric studies. His research program tracks the emergence, meanings, and uses of different understandings of Africa and Africanness. His book reviews, commentaries, and critical essays have been published or are slated to appear in some of the leading journals in rhetorical studies. He received his Ph.D from the University of Kansas.
Morrison Lobby

Saturday, February 20th:
Mix and Mingle with the Cast & Name That Country! | Post-Show
Join the cast of The Call and enjoy complimentary snacks and libations as local playwright, blogger and all around Renaissance woman Claire Willett leads us in a game of Name that Country! – a series of multiple choice questions to test your knowledge about the diverse nations that make up the African continent.  Prizes for the winners!

Click here to see past In Dialogue Events.