In a recent conversation with Artforum’s David Velasco, Gregg Bordowitz discussed his collaboration with Paul Chan on an operatic version of Michel Foucault’s History of Sexuality. Bordowitz wrote a libretto for five characters (Foucault-as-protagonist, Ephebe, Freud, the Pope, and a cop; Bordowitz himself makes a brief appearance as the California academic charged with introducing Foucault at a lecture.) Chan drew the character sketches above. Naturally, Freud wears assless chaps with a prosthetic penis that costumer Kristine Woods has fabricated quite formidably in felt, reportedly.
I’m most interested in the variables at play in the work-on-progress production, which is being staged today and tomorrow at Tanzquartier Wien, In Vienna. Bordowitz, who can’t and therefore hasn’t written a musical score, will direct an improvisational relationship with the performers based on an ambient, electronically-produced sound component that his Viennese counterparts have likened to a medieval chant. “It could be a big mess!” Bordowitz admitted of his production, which will allow for a given degree of on-stage improvisation. This, to my mind, is among the greatest premonitions one can have for a theatrical production!
+ 500 Words: Gregg Bordowitz (Artforum)
