Tess Howsam
Artist Bio
Brooklyn based interdisciplinary artist, Tess Howsam curates and directs ekphrastic shows that blend theater, installation art and performance. Howsam seeks to subvert theatrical expectations, while building cross disciplinary collaborations that offer voices to women identifying artists and address issues of gender.
Howsam is the Founding Artistic Director of the Exquisite Corpse Company. She graduated from Bard College, New York and polished her performance skills at the British American Drama Academy, London, England. Howsam is currently pursuing her MFA in Interdisciplinary Arts from Goddard College, Port Townsend, Washington.
She has worked as performer/director in a variety of New York venues including: Arts@Renaissance, The Barrow Group Theater, Brooklyn Lyceum, Bushwick Starr, Dixon Place, Galapagos Art Space, Governors Island, HERE Art Space, Jimmy's no.43, Signature Theatre, Soho Playhouse, and The Living Theater.
Artist's Statement
I embrace the connective theme of past as present. The installation “Corseted Community,” inspired by iconic artist Frida Kahlo, considers the paradox of restriction and support. Diverse Mexican and US women artists created plaster casts of their torsos. The corset interior provides a canvas for artistic expression. The exterior is collaged with newspaper headlines. What role do these headlines play in our lives? Does the news further divide us? How does the language of our political times bleed into the psyche of our communities? This network of suspended, interconnected torsos symbolizes our shared community - free from walls, borders, and nationalities that too often separate us.
Project
"Corseted Community"
Created by Tess Howsam with (in alphabetical order) Emily Addison, India Bastien, Andrea Caldarise, Jess T. Chang, Becky Cooper, Safi Harriott, Maëlle Jayet, Kayla Mitchell, Valeria Guadalupe Isabel Morgante, Sara Ornelas, Sara Lynn Sterling-Little, Mila Villasana, Liz Walker, Zosha Warpeha, Ran Xia.
Semblanza
Tess Howsam, actor y habitante de la Ciudad de Nueva York es la directora artística de Exquisite Corpse Company. Habiéndose recibido en Bard College, New York, continuó puliendo sus habilidades histriónicas en la British American Drama Academy de Londres, Inglaterra y en el Festival de Teatro Berkshire en Stockbridge, Massachusetts. Howsam se ha desempeñado como diversos escenarios de Nueva York tales como Arts@Renaissance, The Barrow Group Theater, Brooklyn Lyceum, Bushwick Starr, Dixon Place, Galapagos Art Space, Governors Island, HERE Art Space, Jimmy's no.43, Signature Theatre, Soho Playhouse y The Living Theater. En la actualidad cursa estudios para obtener la maestría en Artes Interdisciplinarias en Goddard College, Port Townsend, Washington.
Concepto
Mi interés primordial es integrar temas que enlazan el pasado con el presente. El montaje/instalación que presentaré: “Comunidad Encorsetada” inspirada en la icónica Frida Kahlo, se centrará en la paradoja y significado figurativo que existe entre el sostén o apoyo y sus limitaciones. Diversas mujeres mexicanas y norteamericanas fabricarán moldes de yeso a partir de sus torsos. El interior de cada corsé será un lienzo para la expresión artística. El exterior de los mismos estará cubierto con encabezados de periódicos y noticias. Nos preguntamos: ¿Qué papel juegan estos encabezados en nuestras vidas? ¿Será que las noticias continúan dividiéndonos? ¿Cómo hace sangrar el lenguaje político a las mentes y espíritus de nuestras comunidades en estos tiempos revueltos?
Se video-filmará a las artistas participantes para capturar sus historias en un pequeño cortometraje que acompañará el montaje/instalación. Finalmente, una red de torsos suspendidos e interconectados simbolizará nuestra comunidad compartida- libre de muros, fronteras y nacionalidades que repetidamente nos separan.
MORE on "Corseted Community" and the Artists involved
www.ExquisiteCorpseCompany.com
On Howsam's installations :
“Magritte’s iconography threads vividly through every room, floating umbrellas and green apples and masked bodies, even the giant mouth of a trout in a room in which every inch of the walls is covered in seashells. Of course, none of this would have been possible without the play’s visionary and director, Tess Howsam.”
-Brooklyn Based
Jess T. Chang
Valeria Guadalupe Isabel Morgante
Mila Villasana
Tess Howsam
Tess Howsam
Tess Howsam