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HOME/LAND USA
An international collaboration between Begat Theater (FR), Hand2Mouth (USA) and WaxFactory (USA)
Presentation
Come and travel through a live performance installation to question our relationship to home, comfort, and safety.
HOME/LAND is an immersive journey along the paths of personal and collective memories. Within a context of critical instability, when displacement and forced migrations have caused many to leave their homes and everything they hold dear, audience members are each assigned a temporary unit in a government-run shelter village called Lot 6B.
Audience members will move back and forth through time and witness stories about the singular place, Portland, and all those who have occupied and lived here. HOME/LAND asks audiences to question their own personal relationship to the place they call home and their hopes for what its future might hold.
“Home/Land is a beautiful, haunting, thrilling, tremendous piece of art. It pushes the limits of what theatre can be and calls its audience participants in to contemplate the themes of displacement, safety, and community in an immersive experience that is heartfelt, sensitive, moving, and full of small surprises. Please go see it right now, you won’t wait to miss it!!!”
- Ashley, a local theatre maker/artist
1 idea, 2 shows :
The first show of HOME/LAND was created in the town of Portland, Oregon, USA for performances in September 2022 and is currently available for touring in North America.
A French show will be created for performances in 2023 for touring in France and Europe. Residencies will take place in the towns of Gap, Saint-Auban, Aurillac, Cavaillon, Vieux-Condé, Port Saint Louis and Marseille among others.
The Portland show
September 1st – 18th 2022 | Thursday thru Sundays | by night (7:00 -9:00 pm)
Location : Zidell Yards, Portland, Oregon.
40 tickets sold per performance in single ticket 3 minute time slots. Show lasted approximately 1 hour
Audience members have travelled through the installation, approx ¾ of a mile, during the performance.
Portland cast, crew & credits
The original co-creators include: Geo Alva, Michael Cavazos, Lucille Dawson, Dion Doulis, Karin Holmström, Erika Latta, and Jonathan Walters.
Directors: Dion Doulis, Erika Latta, Karin Holmström, Michael Cavazos, Jonathan Walters, and Geo Alva
Onsite Director: Karin Holmström
Onsite Assistant Director: Michael Cavazos
Voiceover Directors: Dion Doulis and Erika Latta
Portland Interviews by: Michael Cavazos
Script Writers: Dion Doulis, Erika Latta, Karin Holmström, and Michael Cavazos
Translation: Geo Alva
Sound Designers: Dion Doulis and Erika Latta
Video Designer: Michael Cavazos
Set Designers: Karin Holmström and Philippe Laliard
Set Construction: Philippe Laliard, Abby Jacquin, and Ryann St. Julien
Set Dressing: Violet Aveline
Prop Designer: Karin Holmström
Lights: Jon Timm and Abby Jacquin
Stage Management: Michael Cavazos
Cast:
Reception Agent: Vinisa Brown
Intake Agent/Clerk: Sean Doran
Shelter Agent/Concierge: Marissa Sanchez
Drowned Woman: Maia McCarthy
Unit 7: Geo Alva
Outtake Guide: Michael Buchanon
Voiceover cast:
Agency Voice: Erika Latta
Narrator: Dion Doulis
Makiko: Mai Ide
Antonio Morales: Julio Cesar
DACA student: Yasmin Ruvalcaba
YMCA Lady: Maia McCarthy
Rancher: Jonathan Walters
Interview voices:
Makayla Caldwell
Garrett P.
Documentary voices:
The Neighborhood of Albina
- Donna Maxey, courtesy of the Albina Mosaic
The Vanport Flood
- Senator Jackie Winters, courtesy of the Vanport Mosaic and story midwife, Laura Lo Forti
- Ed Washington, courtesy of the Vanport Mosaic and story midwife, Laura Lo Forti
- Evelyn Bolme, courtesy of the Vanport Mosaic and story midwife, Laura Lo Forti
Japanese American Incarceration during WWII
- Shizuko “Suzie” Sakai, courtesy of the Japanese American Museum of Oregon
Special thanks to:
The Zidell Family
Alan Park
Imago Theatre
Outside In
Vanport Mosaic
Tony Domingue
Skanner News
Rose Rodriguez
HOME / LAND is made possible with the support of:
- FACE Contemporary Theater Fund
- Lieux publics, European and national center for artistic creation in public space – Odos – les chemins
- French Ministry of Culture (DGCA and DRAC PACA)
- Département des Alpes de Haute-Provence
- Old Moody @ Zidell Yards
- The Puffin Foundation
- NET TEN
Additional partners in France:
- ECLAT, National center for artistic creation in public space, Aurillac
- Théâtre Durance Scène conventionnée d’intérêt national « art et création », Château Arnoux/Saint-Auban
- La Passerelle National stage, Gap
- La Garance National stage, Cavaillon
- Le Citron Jaune National center for artistic creation in public space, Port Saint Louis du Rhône
- Le Boulon National center for artistic creation in public space, Vieux-Condé
- Théâtre Joliette – Scène conventionnée art et création – expressions et écritures contemporaines, Marseille
- Friche la Belle de Mai – Pôle arts de la scène, Marseille
Photos
Press
Feedback from performances in Portland
“HOME/LAND is an artful composite of forgotten histories and their forgotten people, magically set underneath the Ross Island Bridge. I feel fortunate to have witnessed this worthy experiment.”
- a local music director
“Home / Land is a beautiful, haunting, thrilling, tremendous piece of art. It pushes the limits of what theatre can be and calls its audience participants in to contemplate the themes of displacement, safety, and community in an immersive experience that is heartfelt, sensitive, moving, and full of small surprises. Please go see it right now, you won’t wait to miss it!!!”
- Ashley, a local theatre maker/artist
“That was a masterpiece of interactive theatre. Hand2mouth crafted the site-specific work by which I will measure all others. At once deeply personal and universal, intimate and epic in scope, heartfelt and unnerving in all the right ways. A fascinating multi-layered examination of living through disaster, the illusion of permanence, the work our ancestors undertook simply to get us here, and what it means to really feel safe. I can’t recommend this strongly enough.”
- William Thomas Berk, playwright & producer
“I’m still processing it haha, it was so lovely and the attention to detail was breathtaking. This is the first show I’ve been outside of the theater space that really melds the outside world with the performance. The storytelling and the physical space coexisted so beautifully. The design and layout of everything also really allowed the stories to be heard, but not exploited. I was just filled with so many emontions.”
- Yasmin Ruvalcaba, artist