The Home Project
The Home Project is an immersive performance piece that engages with ideas of homecoming, safety, and complex histories. A home is both a place of shelter and a place of tension -- memories settle into the space, become a part of the architecture, and remain there. They whisper of better or worse times and, when we leave the space, they stay, waiting for us.
Incorporating elements of poetry, dance, immersive theatre, ambient sound design, and even open world video game mechanics, The Home Project was designed as a unique storytelling experience. The piece was devised by putting the performers through writing exercises in which they explored their memories of home. From those writings, a movement language was created for each performer to represent memories they found salient. These solo, duet, and group performances were organized into two loops which were each performed twice during the run of show in different rooms within the three floors of the Samuel Wadsworth Russell House, a nationally registered historic landmark. Each room contained different fragments of the cast's and director's lives in the form of writings and artifacts. The audience was allowed to explore these spaces in any way or order they desired, evoking the feeling of exploring someone's actual house and stumbling on memories, notes, and hidden histories in a way that feels both exciting and intrusive.
Director/Choreographer: Henry Lombino
Stage Manager: Sonya Sternlielb
Production Designer: Ramsay Burgess
Sound Design and Composition: Harrison Nir, inspired by the work of Alvin Lucier.
Performances and writings by: Jessica Chen, Steven Fields, Nathan Mullen, Ilana Newman, Iris Ridley
Advised by Danielle Vogel
Photos by Camille Chossis
