Take a behind-the-scenes look at Laura Anderson Barbata's Intervention: Ocean Blues, a performance featuring The Brooklyn Jumbies Stilt Dancers in Bushwick, New York in 2018.
Take a behind-the-scenes look at Laura Anderson Barbata's Intervention: Ocean Blues, a performance featuring The Brooklyn Jumbies Stilt Dancers in Bushwick, New York in 2018.
INTERVENTION: RED, 2021. LAURA ANDERSON BARBATA IN COLLABORATION WITH THE BROOKLYN JUMBIES; TIMES SQUARE DISTRICT NEW YORK. PHOTO: STEFAN FALKE
Take a behind-the-scenes look at Laura Anderson Barbata's Intervention: Ocean Blues, a performance featuring The Brooklyn Jumbies Stilt Dancers in Bushwick, New York in 2018.
INTERVENTION: RED, 2021. LAURA ANDERSON BARBATA IN COLLABORATION WITH THE BROOKLYN JUMBIES; TIMES SQUARE DISTRICT NEW YORK. PHOTO: STEFAN FALKE
Take a behind-the-scenes look at Laura Anderson Barbata's Intervention: Ocean Blues, a performance featuring The Brooklyn Jumbies Stilt Dancers in Bushwick, New York in 2018.
INTERVENTION: RED, 2021. LAURA ANDERSON BARBATA IN COLLABORATION WITH THE BROOKLYN JUMBIES; TIMES SQUARE DISTRICT NEW YORK. PHOTO: STEFAN FALKE
Take a behind-the-scenes look at Laura Anderson Barbata's Intervention: Ocean Blues, a performance featuring The Brooklyn Jumbies Stilt Dancers in Bushwick, New York in 2018.
INTERVENTION: RED, 2021. LAURA ANDERSON BARBATA IN COLLABORATION WITH THE BROOKLYN JUMBIES; TIMES SQUARE DISTRICT NEW YORK. PHOTO: STEFAN FALKE
Take a behind-the-scenes look at Laura Anderson Barbata's Intervention: Ocean Blues, a performance featuring The Brooklyn Jumbies Stilt Dancers in Bushwick, New York in 2018.
Take a behind-the-scenes look at Laura Anderson Barbata's Intervention: Ocean Blues, a performance featuring The Brooklyn Jumbies Stilt Dancers in Bushwick, New York in 2018.
Intervention: Ocean Blues is inspired by all the forms of life that make the ocean their home, in particular the extraordinary sea creatures that have the gift creating the effect of producing their own light—bioluminescence—and live in the deepest and least explored depths of our ocean. It is a reminder that we must bring light to the crisis impacting life of our Ocean and draw attention to the urgent need to elevate and change the values and practices of private industry, policy, and our own personal choices, to address responsibly sustainable development goals (SDG14) set by the United Nations.
The performance unfolds in an urban environment highly dependent on the health of the oceans, even though it may not be overtly obvious to our urban communities. Intervention: Ocean Blues invites audiences to acknowledge our intersecting identities and to celebrate and honor them by changing behaviors to protect our oceans.
The performance combines dance, procession, ritual, and improvisational interactions with the audience.
Behind-the-scenes video of photo shoot. Bushwick, New York, 2018.
Commissioned by the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum; performed at the ISGM August 9, 2018, and in Brooklyn, NY, September, 2018.
Based in New York, Najja Codrington is a cofounder of Brooklyn Jumbies along with Ali Sylvester and is also musical director of the KowTeff School of African Dance. Codrington was born into a family deeply rooted in both African and African Caribbean culture. At age ten, under the guidance of Obara Wali Rahman, he received his first formal training in the Sabar orchestra as a member of Sabar Ak-Ru-Afrique. Codrington's studies encompass music and dance from both the Caribbean and West Africa. He has traveled to Senegal, West Africa, where he studied under the tutelage of the Drame/Diabaté griot family. As a result, he was exposed to an extensive amount of lore. Having studied African dance and drumming intensively for many years, Codrington has learned from several people, including Sewaa Codrington, Aissatou Diop, Wilhemina Taylor, Gregory Ince, Karim Braithway, Kissima Diabaté, and Souleyman Diop, to name just a few. Currently, he is involved in many cultural activities, including Cultural Youth International's Brooklyn Jumbies, Adlib Steel Pan Orchestra, KowTeff African Dance Company, Bakh Yaye, and A Touch of Folklore & More. Codrington firmly believes that the cultural arts are not merely an economic tool; they are an inherent part of his spirit and a dominant driving force. With this drive, he unselfishly mentors youth, instilling discipline, direction, and pride. He gives special thanks and praise to his mother, without whom he would not be who he is today. Codrington brings high-spirited energy to all groups he embraces.
Brooklyn Jumbies Inc. is an organization whose sole purpose is to heighten the community's cultural awareness of African and African Caribbean culture. Brooklyn Jumbies perform stilt dancing, which is one of the numerous cultural elements of the African and Caribbean diaspora. The founding members of Brooklyn Jumbies Inc. are Ali Sylvester and Najja Codrington. Since 2007, Brooklyn Jumbies Inc. has worked closely with Laura Anderson Barbata, presenting collaborative and outreach projects in Mexico, Jamaica, Singapore, and the United States. Since 2008, they have collaborated with the Zancudos de Zaachila (traditional stilt dancers from Oaxaca). With Anderson Barbata, they have performed in various museums, including the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, Texas; Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York; Centro Nacional de las Artes in Monterrey, Mexico; and Museo de la Ciudad de México. Among their most significant performances are Intervention: Wall Street, presented in the Financial District of New York (2011); Intervention: Indigo (2015), presented in Brooklyn, the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, the National Museum of the American Indian, New York, and Mexico City; Ocean Calling (2017), commissioned by Thyssen-Bornemisza Contemporary Academy and presented at the United Nations Plaza, New York; and Intervention: Ocean Blues (2018), commissioned by and performed at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston, and in DUMBO, Brooklyn, as part of the New York Rise for Climate, Jobs and Justice week organized by No Longer Empty.
Born in Mexico City, Laura Anderson Barbata is a Mexican transdisciplinary artist currently based in New York and Mexico City. Since 1992, she has initiated long-term projects and collaborations in the Venezuelan Amazon, Trinidad and Tobago, Mexico, Norway, and the United States that address social justice and the environment. Her work often combines performance, procession, dance, music, spoken word, textile arts, costuming, papermaking, zines, and protest.
Barbata's work is in various private and public collections, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Museo de Arte Moderno, Mexico City; and Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary. Her work has received the Anonymous Was a Woman Award, grants from FONCA-INBA Mexico, the Mario Trujillo García Defense for Human Rights Award (Mexico), and the Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Artist in Residence Award, among others.
Barbata teaches in the Art, Culture, and Technology program at MIT and is an honorary fellow of the Latin American, Caribbean, and Iberian Studies (LACIS) Program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
292 Main Street, Cambridge, MA
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Intervention: Ocean Blues (Behind-the-scenes), 2018 was created by Laura Anderson Barbata in collaboration with The Brooklyn Jumbies and filmed in Bushwick, New York, 2018.
Video: Kevin Alex
Dancers: Najja Codrington, Keil Alibocas, Khyle Lambert, Jabari Rollocks, Bonivia Bartolo, Madison Blake, Cheikh Gueye, Jahde Huntley, Fatouseck Primus, Yuko Tsuji, Mei Yamanaka
Commissioned by the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum; performed at the ISGM August 9th, 2018, and in Brooklyn, NY, September, 2018
Sponsored in part by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Wallace Minot Leonard Foundation, the Barr Foundation ArtsAmplified Initiative, the Josephine and Louise Crane Foundation, Lenoir Charitable Trust, Liberty Mutual Foundation, Janet Burke Mann Foundation, and the Rowland Foundation.
The Brooklyn Jumbies Stilt Dancers:
Najja Codrington
Keil Alibocas
Khyle Lambert
Jabari Rollocks
Bonivia Bartolo
Ground Dancers:
Madison Blake
Cheikh Gueye
Jahde Huntley
Fatouseck Primus
Yuko Tsuji
Mei Yamanaka
Textile Sculptures Team:
Laura Anderson Barbata
Matthieu Goedefroot
Seancolin Hankins
Monica Mendoza Bravo
Karin Persan-Better Than Jam
Lorna Watts
Still Photography:
Frank Veronsky
Jennifer Pierce
Laura Anderson Barbata wishes to thank:
The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
Pieranna Cavalchini
Tiffany York
Manon Slome
Raquel de Alba
No Longer Empty
Beyond Studios
Life, Death, & Revelry and related programming at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum is generously sponsored in part by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Wallace Minot Leonard Foundation, and the Barr Foundation ArtsAmplified Initiative. Education and community programs are funded in part by the Josephine and Louise Crane Foundation, Lenoir Charitable Trust, Liberty Mutual Foundation, Janet Burke Mann Foundation, and the Rowland Foundation. Studio activities are generously sponsored by the Polly Thayer Starr Charitable Trust. These programs are funded in part by the Massachusetts Cultural Council, which receives support from the State of Massachusetts and the National Endowment for the Arts.
