SLAMDANCE garage

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February 2025

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SLAMDANCE garage » February 2025 »

Created and performed by Ian Andrew Askew
Produced in association with ¡Oye! Group

SLAMDANCE garage is a solo performance on punk and blackness. Nestled somewhere between performance art, a rock show, and an one-act opera, Ian Andrew Askew hurdles through an hour of music, movement, and text celebrating the absurdity of explaining Black people’s participation in their own culture.

SLAMDANCE garage borrows text from Nina Simone, Audre Lorde, Drexciya, and other luminaries, reharmonizing their words to the sounds of drums, distorted vocals, and the blaring resonance of a custom-one string bass. Inspired by the Malawian babatoni, Mississippi diddley-bow, and the Afro-Brazilian berimbau, the handmade instrument (nearly the same length as its player) is an homage to throughlines of musical technology that weave through the African diaspora.

  • "In turn ferocious and tenderly supportive, SLAMDANCE garage [is] a heady mix of art installation, rock concert, ritual rites, brooding dance, and spoken word — to mine the essence of Blackness."

    – Interludes

  • "There’s no questioning the rigor and discipline of Askew’s relentless, restless performance"

    – Interludes

  • "Theater at its best: a provocation to act and a welcome reminder that we, the audience or public, cannot be subdued or silenced."

    – 3 Views

  • "To be in the belly of this show, to be the roiling guts, is one of the most visceral experiences I have ever been a part of..."

    – 3 Views

  • "You don’t have to ever have been to a punk show before. You don’t even have to like punk..."

    – 3 Views

  • "[a] thundering new work... Askew’s tightly structured solo piece presents their full self, in all their tenderness and rage"

    – Theaterly

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  • Ian Andrew Askew

    Creator / Performer

    Ian Andrew Askew is an artist working in music, theater, and performance. Their research is concerned with historical absurdities, manufactured scarcities, and contrary negritudes. Recent projects include Unnamed Leagues (Peabody Essex Museum), Until Other Times (JACK), and Sorry John Henry the song has no end (developed in residency at Hubbard Hall, Baryshnikov Arts Center, and Wake Forest University). As a sound artist, they have created scores for installations and performances by Christopher Myers, Kaneza Schaal, Jackie Sibblies Drury, Joie Lee, James Gibbel, and Kamal Nassif. Ian co-sound designed and performed in KLII (Walker Art Center, REDCAT, Chelsea Factory). As an associate stage director for opera, they have presented work with Lincoln Center, The American Repertory Theater, The Metropolitan Museum, Detroit Opera, Spoleto Festival USA, LA Opera, Boston Lyric Opera, San Francisco Opera, and Carolina Performing Arts. Upcoming: In the Space Between with VLA Dance, presented by The Theater Offensive. ianandrewaskew.com

Production Designer Cheyanne Williams, Lighting Designer Itohan Edoloyi, Sound Designer Anthony Sertel Dean, Movement Director Justin Allen, Stage Manager Sydneii Colter, Assistant Stage Manager Malena Logan, Assistant Costume Designer Noah Willis-Hogan, Audio Describer Shara Lunon, Line Producer Alverneq Lindsay

SLAMDANCE garage is made possible in part by the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA), Foundation for Contemporary Arts (FCA), and the New York Chapter of the Awesome Foundation, or AwesomeNYC @awesomefound.nyc

The SLAMDANCE series was conceived through an independent study with Harvard Theater, Dance, and Media. SLAMDANCE TV, a video essay, was commissioned and published by The Kitchen in 2021. SLAMDANCE garage was presented in-progress at The Performing Garage in 2021 with support from Kaneza Schaal and the Wooster Group. The Bushwick Starr’s presentation of SLAMDANCE garage was developed in residency at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, MA.