Panel Discussion
6:30 p.m.
National Academies’ Keck Center
500 Fifth St., N.W., Washington, D.C.
Free; Photo ID required.
Reservations required: email cpnas@nas.edu or call (202) 334-2415

 Listen to the Panel Discussion (mp3, 92 minutes)

The 6:30 p.m. panel discussion at The National Academies’ Keck Center will bring together prominent neuroscientists Amy Bastian, Ed Connor, and Guy McKhann, professors of neurology and neuroscience at the Zanvyl Krieger Mind/Brain Institute at Johns Hopkins University, performance artist Jonah Bokaer, and Michael Kahn, artistic director of the Shakespeare Theatre Company, to discuss the nexus between neuroscience and the performing arts. The panelists will examine how writers and performing artists approach neurological themes drawing on examples from both Bokaer’s recently choreographed work REPLICA and the play King Lear which is currently being staged by the Shakespeare Theatre Company. The panel will be facilitated by Kevin Finneran, a former film and literature professor who is now editor of The National Academies’ policy magazine Issues in Science and Technology.

RELATED EVENT AT SIDNEY HARMAN HALL:

REPLICA
Performance by choreographer and performance artist Jonah Bokaer
12 p.m.
Happenings at the Harman
Sidney Harman Hall
610 F St., N.W., Washington, D.C.
Free; Seating is on a first-come, first-served basis.

REPLICA, a collaborative performance piece by Daniel Arsham, Jonah Bokaer, and Judith Sanchez Ruiz, examines memory loss, pattern recognition, and perceptual faculties as they apply to the human body. The piece employs built spaces, objects, lighting, and other media to create the illusion of an expanded space through the use of video and/or still images. REPLICA creates situations onstage that could not veritably exist in physical space: this happens through the use of creative geography in video and built spaces, transporting movement to different locations that appear to be just outside the sightline of the audience.

Daniel Arsham is a visual artist who toys with notions of Architecture. His work has been shown in solo and group shows in New York, Miami, Paris, and Amsterdam. He has twice created sets for Merce Cunningham Dance Company. Arsham was the recipient of the Gelman Trust Fellowship (2003).

Jonah Bokaer is an award-winning choreographer and media artist. He has worked with Merce Cunningham (2000-2007), John Jasperse (2004-2005), David Gordon (2005-2006), Deborah Hay (2005), Tino Sehgal (2008), and Robert Wilson (2007-present), with whom he has choreographed hour large-scale works addressing altered states in the human mind.

Judith Sanchez Ruiz has a rich performing history, having worked with DanzAbierta Company, Cuba (1991-1996), Mal Pelo Dance Company, Spain (1997-1999), David Zambrano (1997), and Trisha Brown Dance Company since 2006. As a choreographer, Sanchez has been pursuing an original approach to experimental dance forms since 1993. She was awarded "Mujeres Destacades 2008" by the Spanish newspaper El Diario.

Co-sponsored by the Shakespeare Theatre Company

Click here for other upcoming events

Click here to visit Jonah Bokaer's website and to see additional venues where REPLICA will be performed

Click here to download a PDF of the REPLICA brochure featuring the essay, Replica & the Tangled Hierarchy of Doubling by Michael Maizels. 

Click here to learn more about Happenings at the Harman

For more information: (202) 334-2436 or cpnas@nas.edu