Penny Arcade
CoachingProject: Individuality, Identity and Authenticity

INDIVIDUALITY, IDENTITY AND AUTHENTICITY Penny Arcade has incorporated dance and movement in her work since 1985. For ImPulsTanz' 25th Anniversery, Penny Arcade is creating a special workshop for dancers who wish to integrate performance art, theatre and video into their work that is backed by rigorous inquiry as well as for dancers who wish to work from an autobiographical or memoir point of view. The workshops will include an overview of Perfomance Art and Experimental Theatre history . Since Penny Arcade brings immediacy and authenticity to every aspect of her work, these workshops will be geared to both the immediate and long range needs of the workshop participants in a very personal way. Art is a vocation not a profession, says Penny. Who you are, your individuality, your uniqueness, is what you have to offer to the world and is what you use to create and inform your work. Workshops will be divided into lecture and performance segments. Workshop participants will examine segments from several of Penny Arcade's 8 full length works on archival video and participants will learn atom by atom how to create work from a rigorous personal inquiry. These workshops are suitable for artists who range from the beginner to the most accomplished artist. Be prepared to bring your specific performance questions to incorporate into the performance workshop segments. Penny Arcade (Susana Ventura) is an internationally acclaimed and respected writer, poet, essayist, cultural critic, performance, theater and video artist and cultural icon. She is one of the few performance artists to gain international renown in the mainstream theatre and entertainment world. An original member of The Playhouse of The Ridiculous, NY's famed queer, glitter/glam political theatre, that influenced everything from Punk to current performance. She was a teenage superstar for Andy Warhol's Factory, featured in the film Women In Revolt now available on DVD. Penny Arcade occupies a rare position in the American avante garde and countercoulture . She is one of the few independent American artists who has been able to sustain a 40 year career in the theater and she is at the top of her game in an arena she helped define. She is the author of ten full length perfomance plays and numerous solo shows,including Bitch!Dyke!Faghag!Whore! , her sex and censorship show, whose influence is incalculable as a mainstream commercial hit in 22 cities around the world and spearheaded the current neo burlesque movement She is one of a handful of artists that defined Performance Art from the 1980s and she continues to define both solo and group performance art. She is a popular and gifted lecturer on Performance Art ; It's History and Practice, 1960's Experimental Theater, 1980's Performance Art, Queer Theater, Art and Activism, The World of Andy Warhol , the Universe of Jack Smith, Theater of The Ridiculous, The Architects of The American Counter Culture among other subjects. With her long history of involvement in the visual arts she is also frequent lecturer in art schools and is a committed and adventurous critic and mentor. Her workshops on Performance Art, writing and staging for Performance Art, Autobiographical Performance and Memoir, The Alchemy of Poetry to Performance, Video in Performance, Movement, Dance and Words, among other site and topic specific workshops are geared to the needs of specific groups and are inspirational and as life altering as her on stage performance work. Her award winning documentary project LES Biography Project, Stemming The Tide Of Cultural Amnesia, has broadcasts weekly in NY since 1999.