I incorporated a text fragment from one of Euripides’ lost tragedies to an image of an abandoned dollhouse discovered on a sidewalk. Informally, the piece is called Enclose the Divine. This work is part of a larger project called IOTA that brings to life the remaining textual fragments of the lost plays by Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. The Fragment What…
Author: Jamie
Love is The Fullest Education (Motion)
Muriel Maffre, Ryan Tacata, Derek Phillips and myself performed a site specific theatre piece with the fragments of one of the lost tragedies by Euripides on Slacker Hill in the Marin Headlands. Informally, we called the work Love is The Fullest Education and the fragment relates the myth of Zeus’ seduction of Io in…
In Time of Need: Sophocles Fragment #117
I incorporated a text fragment from one of Sophocles’ lost tragedies to an image of an abandoned house outside Watsonville. Informally, the piece is called In Time of Need. This work is part of a larger project called IOTA that brings to life the remaining textual fragments of the lost plays of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. The Fragment For … shines…
Sophocles Phedre at Sutro Baths
For no city can be safe in which justice and good sense are trampled under foot, and aclever talker criminally grasps a goad and guides the city. Sophocles Phaedra at Sutro Baths UPCOMING SPRING 2021
The Man Who Knows: Euripides Fragment #115
At 5:40Am. on March 23rd, 2020 I incorporated a text fragment from one of Euripides’ lost tragedies with a site responsive approach to Environmental Art and Public Art (The statue: To Honor Surfing Statue) on Santa Cruz’s Westside. Informally, the piece is called The Man Who Knows. This work is part of a larger project called IOTA that brings to life the remaining textual fragments…
Sophocles’ Laocoön at BAMPFA
At noon on March 9th, 2020 we performed a site responsive theatre production of a fragment from Sophocles tragedy Laocoön at the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive The Fragment And fire shines on the altar in the streetas it sends up a vapor from drops of myrrh,exotic scents. Poseidon, you who range over…
Sophocles Laocöon at Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive
after the wooden horseis brought into the citythe Trojans celebratedbelieving the war over A sacrifice to Poseidonfor removing the Greekswith Laocoōna priest of Poseidonordered to carry it out Cassandra and Laocoönwarn of the impending dangerwithin the horsewith Laocoön sinning against the godsby attacking the horse with a spear two serpents appearnamed Porces and Chariboea(the Greek poet…
Aeschylus Danaids at the Pulgas Water Temple
At 4:45pm on November 19th, 2018 we performed a site responsive theatre piece of the two remaining fragments of Aeschylus Danaids at the Pulgas Water Temple in San Mateo county. This work is part of a larger project called IOTA that brings to life the remaining fragments for the lost plays of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. The weather was cloudy, with…
Path of Steady Success: Euripides Fragment #259
At noon. on May 9th, 2018we performed a site responsive theatre productionof a Euripides fragment we titled Path of Steady Successin East Palo Alto The weather was sunnywith a temperature of 64℉The duration of the performancewas 5 minutesfor an audience of 4 The FragmentThe man on the path of steady successshould not think that he…
Aeschylus #121
Seated Women in a Garden, Picasso inspiration for Aeschylus #121 Upcoming: Saturday, April 21st, Blake Garden, Kensington with Tonyanna Borkovi. Part of a series of “rituals” curated by Yula Paluy.
Exploring #25
Sophocles’ Pandora (Hammer-Strikers)
Zeus punished men for Prometheus’ theft of fire by causing the first woman to be created out of clay This woman is Pandora: ‘All-Gifted’, because of the gifts provided her by the gods She is Man’s punishment for the theft of fire Pandora opens the jar in which all kinds of evils are contained they…
Oedipus in Fort Mason Chapel
The staged reading of Oedipus happened last night in Fort Mason Chapel for SF International Arts Festival … I’m biased but i thought it was marvelous and more than anything I’m in awe of the incredible effort intelligence, humor and grace of my collaborators in this all too brief adventure thank you Muriel Maffre, John Warren…
Aeschylus’ Diktyoulkoi (Net Haulers)
the play set on the island of Seriphos with the arrival of Danaë and her infant Perseus Danaë’s father Acrisius had set them adrift in a wooden chest a fisherman nets a large object offshore he seeks the help of Dictys the brother of the local king Polydectes in hauling the chest ashore struggling they…
Albrecht Durer: Bacchanal With Silenus
inspiration for Aeschylus‘ Net Haulers…
Exploring #24
Savage Blasts: Sophocles Fragment #116 at The Wave Organ
We performed a site responsive theatre piece using a fragment of text from a lost Sophocles tragedy at the Wave Organ in San Francisco. Informally, the piece is called Savage Blasts. This work is part of a larger project called IOTA that brings to life the fragments for the lost plays of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. The Fragment… he blows no longer on small pipes, but with…
Sophocles Nausicaä at Pillar Point
The Production… At 1:08 p.m. on July 10th, 2016 we performed a site responsive theatre production of the remaining fragments of Sophocles Nausicaä at Pillar Point The weather was sunny with a temperature of 72℉ The duration of the performance was 65 minutes for an audience of 37 Aleta Hayes, Jamie Lyons, Judy Syrkin-Nikolau, Benjamin…
Backstage at Pillar Point
Judy Syrkin-Nikolau (Nausicaä) backstage in wildflowers at Pillar Point…
Sopohocles’ Nausicaä Perfromance
The Iota and The Chocolate Heads present Sophocles’ lost drama Nausicaä… Afternoon, July 10th, Half Moon Bay Only a few fragments remain from Sophocles original play which was presumably based upon the fifth and sixth books of the Odyssey. The Fragment… …to weave robes and tunics made of linen… The wave passed me by then…
Rehearsing Nausicaä
Judy Syrkin-Nikolau and Amber Levine rehearsing a moment for Sophocles’ Nausicaä
Rehearsing Nausicaä on site
Nausicaä design meeting
We have the best design meetings….
Nausicaä & Odysseus
Judy Syrkin-Nikolau and Ben Cohn of The Chocolate Heads rehearsing Sophocles Nausicaä with the choreographic expertise of Aleta Hayes
Timothy Lee as Poseidon
Timothy Lee of The Chocolate Heads as Poseidon in Sophocles Nausicaä with Choreographic expertise from Aleta Hayes
rehearsing Sophocles Nausicaä
Poseidon vs. Odysseus “Poseidon god of the earthquake launched a colossal wave, terrible, murderous, arching over him, pounding down on him, hard as a windstorm blasting piles of dry parched chaff, scattering flying husks…” The Odyssey, trans. Robert Fagles Sophocles Nausicaä rehearsal with The Chocolate Heads in Stanford Theater and Performance Studies‘ Prosser Studio
Rehearsing Sophocles’ Nausicaä
Rehearsing Sophocles No. 116
Early morning rehearsal of Sophocles fragment number 116 with barking sea lions pelicans diving for fish fascinated tourists and local runners the amazing soundscape by Derek Phillips and the beautiful movement Of Lauren Dietrich Chavez
Love is The Fullest Education: Euripides Fragment No. 91
At 6:57 a.m. on April 7th, 2016 Muriel Maffre, Ryan Tacata and myself performed a site responsive theatre production of a fragments of one of the lost tragedies by Euripides on Slacker Hill in the Marin Headlands. Informally, the piece we called the work Love is The Fullest Education and the fragment relates the myth of Zeus’ seduction of Io in the form of a…
Slacker Hill Sunrise (Euripides Fragment #91 preshow)
Last minute notes and warmup with Muriel and Ryan
Sophocles No. 116 rehearsal
Wave Organ Rehearsal
Piero di Cosimo: Perseus Rescuing Andromeda (1510/13)
Update: Euripides #91
Euripides #91 postponed on account of Zeus (i.e. Clouds/Fog) not making his call time. But oh, what a sunrise…
Walk Thru of Site
Exploring #24
Upcoming
Speechless Fish: Sophocles Fragment #110 At San Gregorio
The Production… At 3:57 p.m. on December 23rd, 2015I performed a site specific productionof an unattributed fragment of Sophoclesin San Gregoriowith eight dead fish on a fence The weather was partly cloudywith a temperature of 52℉The duration of the performancewas two and a half minutesfor an audience of 3 The Fragment… A chorus of speechless…
Arnold Genthe’s photos of Chinatown
From The Spectator, 25 OCTOBER 1913, Page 25, The Spectator Old Chinatown: a Book of Pictures by Arnold Genthe With Text by Will Irwin. (Sidgwick and Jackson. 7s. 6d. net.)—The Old Chinatown of San Francisco was completely destroyed by the earthquake and fire of 1906; but we can imagine no better memorial to it than…
Cloud Talk: Sophocles Fragment #137
On October 9th, 2015 Rebecca Ormiston, Ryan Tacata and myself created an experimental piece for Artist Weather TV that incorporated a text fragment from one of Sophocles’ lost tragedies: Sophocles Fragment #137. Informally, the piece is called Cloud Talk. This work is part of a larger project called IOTA that brings to life the remaining…
Aeschylus The Argo At San Francisco Maritime
At 2:45 p.m. on October 3rd, 2015 I performed a site responsive theater piece of the only remaining fragment from Aeschylus’ The Argo in the hold of the schooner C.A. Thayer at San Francisco Maritime National Historic Park. based on Aeschylus’ The Argo adapted and directed by Jamie Lyons The early stages of the Argonaut…
Argo Rehearsal aboard C.A. Thayer
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Nelly Sougioultzoglou & Mona Paeva, 1927
Mona Paeva dancing on the Parthenon photographer Nelly (also known as Elli Sougioultzoglou-Seraidari)
No Man’s Friend: Euripides Fragment # 266 At Aquatic Park
At 5:55 a.m. on July 1st, 2015 we performed a site responsive theatre production of an unattributed fragment of one of the lost tragedies by Euripides’ at Aquatic Park in San Francisco. Informally, the piece is called No Man’s Friend. based on Euripides’ fragments adapted and directed by Jamie Lyons with Val Sinkler & Jamie Freebury The Fragment… No man’s friend stays faithful to his tomb….
Aeschylus Daughters of the Sun at Año Nuevo
At 6:25 a.m. on April 24th, 2015 I performed a site responsive theatre production of Aeschylus Daughters of The Sun in the waves off Año Nuevo State Park adapted and directed by Jamie Lyons performed by Jamie Lyons location: Año Nuevo State Park The Play… the story of how Phaëthon meet his death while attempting to…
Electra Work
James Baldwin: “Take This Hammer” (1963)
“There is no moral distance between the facts of life in San Francisco and the facts of life in Birmingham.” In the summer of 1963, the KQED Film Unit invited author James Baldwin to investigate racism in San Francisco. Baldwin agreed to be filmed while he scrutinized the liberal, cosmopolitan image projected by the city….
16th c. Costume Studies for Sophocles’ “Oedipus Tyrannus”
Paolo Veronese (Italian, 1528 – 1588) created these costume studies in preparation for the inaugural production of Sophocles’ tragic play Oedipus Tyrannus at the Teatro Olimpico in Verona, which took place March 1585. Although he was not credited as the play’s costume designer, the designs on this sheet were apparently consulted and incorporated. Inscriptions on…
The Mechanics Monument by Douglas Tilden
In April of 1937, in a demonstration that ‘Athletic dance was the future sport of American men”. Ted Shawn and His Men Dancers performed at The Mechanics Monument by Douglas Tilden. The sculpture, located at the intersection of Market, Bush and Battery Streets in San Francisco, was dedicated on May 15, 1901. President Theodore Roosevelt…
Laocoön by William Blake
If Morality was Christianity Socrates was the Saviour יה [Jehovah] & his two Sons Satan & Adam as they were copied from the Cherubim of Solomons Temple by three Rhodians & applied to Natural Fact, or History of Ilium Art Degraded Imagination Denied War Governed the Nations Evil Good & Evil are Riches & Poverty…
Jason deCaires Taylor’s “Rising Tide”
Jason deCaires Taylor’s “Rising Tide”: four life-size horses and their riders on the banks of Thames River, London.
Russian Site Specific Theatre in the 1920s
Photographs by Alexander Grinberg (1885-1979,) one of the most respected Russian photographers of the 20th c. His prestige was on the rise throughout the 1920s until 1929 when, under the storm of the cultural revolution the “old school” of Soviet photography came under fire as “depraved”, and Grinberg fell out of favor. His photography was…
Cy Twombly: Fifty Days at Iliam
“And we who have always thought of happiness climbing, would feel the emotion that almost startles when happiness falls.” Cy Twombly Twombly stipulated the spatial configuration of the ten large canvases in a presentation that was sequential as well as logical thematically. An antechamber contains the emblematic painting Shield of Achilles, the armor made for…
Paul Nash’s Laocoôn
There are places, just as there are people and objects… whose relationship of parts creates a mystery. Paul Nash’s A Private World comprises 25 photographs taken between 1931 and 1946 the images were taken on a pocket Kodak series 2 (the only camera he ever owned) given to him by his wife Nash’s photography captured prehistoric…
Exploring #23
Site Specific Theatre, San Quentin State Prison
Rehearing Nausicaä
Odysseus drowning… Site Specific rehearsal of Nausicaä
Euripides’ Antigone
I was in love; and that love is madness for mortals. Euripidies’ Antigone Site Specific Theatre Perfromance of Euripides Antigone
Exploring #22
Site Specific Theatre
Sophocles, Unattributed Fragment (S.180)
My fate is always revolving on the fast-moving wheel of the goddess changing its nature just as the appearance of the moon cannot remain for two nights in the same shape but first emerges from obscurity as new making its face more beautiful coming to fullness when it is at its loveliest it dissolves…
Exploring #21
Exploring #20
Exploring a new site specific theatre location.
Working at the Wave Organ
Exploring #19
Exploring a new site specific theatre location, Half Moon Bay.
Exploring #18
Exploring a new site specific theatre location, Hearst Tomb
Andromeda Research
Aeschylus’ The Bacchae (A.9)
The one surviving fragment suits any play concerning the punishment of an enemy of Dionysus. The Fragment… Evil, you see, comes swiftly upon mortals: the offence comes home to him who breaks the bounds of right. A site specific theatre production of Aeschylus’ The Bacchae
Exploring #17
Exploring the water temple as a location for a future site specific performance.
Exploring #16
Exploring the Richmond shoreline for a future site specific performance.
Sophocles’ Polyxene (S.77)
the Ghost of Achilles appears warning the Greeks to postpone their departure prophesying disastrous consequences a quarrel develops between Agamemnon and Menelaus resulting in the departure of Menelaus while Agamemnon remains to sacrifice Polyxena The Fragment… MENELAUS Do you remain here somewhere in the land of Ida and round up the flocks of Olympus for…
Cassandra Imploring Athena
What sort of man can I guess was author of these deeds, the man who in his insolence wrenched headlong from its base my image, and dragged the prophetic maiden from the altar in defiance of the gods? Sophocles’ Ajax the Locrian
Andromeda Strain
Inspiration for a future site responsive theatre performance of Euripides‘ Andromeda.
Rehearsing Euripides Fragement (Aquatic Park)
Val Sinkler rehearsing a Euripides Fragment in Aquatic Park… In 1902, it became illegal to bury new bodies in the cityBy 1921, the bodies were being moved en masse to ColmaBy 1941 nearly all of San Francisco’s cemeteries were gone Most of the city’s early deadthat filled the early cemeteries were lonersminers and immigrants These…
Rehearsal E.266
Showcase of work so far…
as part of the Collected Works’ Franconia Performance Salon at the Museum of Performance + Design we’ll be showing the documentation of our performances Saturday, June 27th, 6:30pm @ MP+D 893B Folsom St. San Francisco work to be shown will include… Aeschylus’ Daughters of the Sun Sophocles’ Sinon and Aeschylus’ Glaucus of Pontiae A presentation…
Philoctetes
Research for a series of site responsive theatre performances of Philoctetes. The Myth… in return for lighting Heracles funeral pyre Philoctetes is bequeathed his bow and arrows en route to Troy he is incapacitated by a snakebite and left behind by the Greeks on the island of Lemnos after a seer reveals that Troy can…
Exploring #14
Exploring a location for a future site specific theatre performance.
Athamas and Ino
Inspiration for a site responsive theatre performance involving Athamas and Ino.
De Chirco: Jupiter at The Sea
Inspiration for Glaucus
Inspiration for a site responsive theatre performance of Glaucus.
Aeschylus Glaucus of Potniae at Golden Gate Fields
At 1:15 p.m. on June 6th, 2015 we performed a site responsive theater piece with the fragments that remain from the lost Aeschylus tragedy, Glaucus of Potniae, at the Golden Gates Fields horse racing track. The Play… Glaucus reared his horse on human flesh so as to make her fiercer she ultimately turns on Glaucus…
Inspiration for Aeschylus’ Circe
source: NY Times fashion photo from 50s Inspiration for a site specific theater performance of Aeschylus’ Circe.
Pasiphaë
Denials from me will no longer convince you; for the facts are now quite clear. If I had thrown myself at a man in love’s furtive commerce, I should rightly now be revealed as lascivious. As it is, because my madness was a god’s onslaught, I hurt, but my trouble is not voluntary. Why, it…
Wave Organ Joe
Joe lives off social security. Has to fish for his dinner.
Exploring #13 (Palace of Fine Arts)
Exploring the Palace of Fine Arts for a future site responsive theatre performance.
Robert Graves, “Lament for Pasiphae”
Dying Sun, shine warm a little longer! My eye, dazzled with tears, shall dazzle yours, Conjuring you to shine and not to move. You, Sun, and I all afternoon have laboured Beneath a dewless and oppressive cloud – A fleece now gilded with our common grief That this must be a night without a moon….
Peter Richards & The Wave Organ
Peter Richards (a senior artist at the Exploratorium) shares his inspiration for creating the wave organ and explores its function as a theatre in which many different kinds of human experiences unfold..
Exploring #12
Exploring a future location for a site specific theatre performance.
Cretans Inspiration…
Inspiration for a future site responsive theatre production of Euripides Cretans. Inspiration for a site specific theatre production of Euripides’ Cretans. The Cretan and Spartan laws were found to be faulty because they did not permit their subjects to taste the greatest pleasures. […] The pleasures of banquets are drinking and singing. In order to…
Sophocles Sinon at The Emeryville Mudflats
At 8:01 p.m. on May 4th, 2015 we performed a site responsive theatre event of Sophocles’ Sinon (using the textual fragments that have survived) in the Emeryville Mudflats: adjacent to the Oakland-San Francisco Bay Bridge. based on Sophocles’ fragments adapted and directed by Jamie Lyons performed by Todd Pivetti The Play… left behind by the…
The Trojan Horse
The Trojan Horse for IOTA’s Site Responsive Theatre production of Sophocles’ Sinon on the Emeryville Mudflats. What a thing was this, too, which that mighty man wrought and endured in the carven horse, wherein all we chiefs of the Argives were sitting, bearing to the Trojans death and fate! But come now, change thy theme, and sing…
Amymone Rehearsal 1
study for the fragment of sophocles’ satyr drama amymone…
Rehearsal
site specific theatre rehearsal
Andromeda Research
“I approach creativity like a sport, where if I have a drawing I react just like a jock: LOOK AT THE FUCKING DRAWING RIGHT THERE YEAH!” — Kanye inspiration for a site specific theatre production of Euripides’ Andromeda.
Phaëthon Research
Inspiration for The Iota’s site specific theatre production of Aeschylus’ Daughters of the Sun.
Golden Gate Fields
Location… originally Rancho San Antonio owned by José Domingo Peralta Peralta sold it in July 1852 to John Fleming who used it as a transhipment point for shipping his cattle across the bay for slaughter and processing later in the 19th century it became the site of the Giant Powder Company a manufacturer of black…
Aeschylus Circe
The Story… Odysseus’ first visit to after his companions had been transformed into pigs. The Fragment… He was seen thinly sown in yellow, which is the ultimate of wandering. Inspiration for The Iota’s site specific theatre production of Aeschylus’ Daughters of the Sun.
Euripides’ Sciron (E.49)
Satyrs, led as usual by their ‘father’ Silenus, are in servitude to Sciron; they tended, not their master’s animals for his enjoyment, but passers-by whom they lured with prostitutes Sciron then killed these unfortunate men until Theseus came by, destroyed Sciron, and freed the satyrs. The Fragments… SILENUS: Hermes, for you indeed… hold… You can…
Euripides’ Oenomaus (E.37)
Oenomaus obstructed his daughter’s marriage, either fearing his new son-in-law would kill him or because he was in love with her himself he had invincible chariot horses and challenged all of Hippodamia’s suitors to a chariot race in which the loser was to be killed. Oenomaus invariably won these races until Pelops has Oenomaus’ charioteer…
Euripides’ Lamia (E.32)
Lamia was a beautiful Libyan girl seduced by Zeus in jealousy Zeus’s wife Hera destroyed her children Lamia’s grief made her hideous and she became a killer of others’ children The Fragment… LAMIA Who does not know my name that men revile, Lamia, the Libyan by race?
Sophocles’ Pandora (S.66)
Zeus punished men for Prometheus’ theft of fire by causing the first woman to be created out of clay This woman is Pandora: ‘All-Gifted’, because of the gifts provided her by the gods She is Man’s punishment for the theft of fire Pandora opens the jar in which all kinds of evils are contained they…