Performance Anxiety Returns to ChinaTown Soup - Photo Story by Alex Sullivan

Uniska Whala Kano performs at Performance Anxiety, Chinatown Soup, NYC. February 11, 2019. Photo courtesy of Alex Sullivan

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Performance Anxiety, a seasoned performance series produced by artist and community organizer, Ventiko, returned to NYC's Chinatown Soup earlier this month after a brief hiatus. Since 2012, the performance series has occupied many LES galleries promoting the work of over 100 performance artists. The artists for this month's relaunch promoted several New York performance veterans including Oya Damla, Uniska Wahala Kano, Sara Meghdari, Sierra Ortega, and Polina Riabova. Performance is Alive correspondent, Alex Sullivan, witnessed the bold programming and retells her experiences through a photographic lens. 

SIERRA ORTEGA

Excavating shameful secrets only to destroy and devour them, though this clearly brings no comfort.

POLINA RIABOVA

A lost “party animal” undulating through pools of light, shedding tears, glitter, and pathos.

Sara Meghdari

Wrestling ownership of her body from history like juice from the pomegranate she kneads to seeds and pulp.

Uniska Whala Kano

A brutally cathartic reckoning with the complicit nature of ourselves as audience.

Oya Damla

Embodied needs amplified through an electric conduit of power and sound.

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PIA CORRESPONDENT // Alex Sullivan is an interdisciplinary artist, New York City native, computer whisperer, occasional photographer, and solver of small puzzles. She received an MFA in Art Practice from the School of Visual Arts, a BFA in Studio Art and a BA in Women’s Studies from Penn State. Through boundary disrupting interactions using touch, varying levels of sensory deprivation or distortion, conversation, performance, audio, objects, and video, her work explores the world of embodied knowledge where our beliefs and behaviors resist easy articulation.