Commons Choir/Daria Faïn & Robert Kocik
Biography
The Prosodic Body is a new field of research that explores language as sound, embodiment and utmost expression: tone, intention, rhythm, gesture, the tacit and evocation are all acts of prosody. The Prosodic Body is a practice that manifests in various areas: principally performance, architecture, health, education and socioeconomic justice. We are at once deeply committed to the cultural cruciality of poets and performers. We call this social aspect of our work “commoning.” One branch of our commoning work is our Commons Choir.
Since 2006, the Prosodic Body has created 5 artworks out of its research in various disciplines –vocal and dance performance, architectural construction, film, and text – that each uniquely investigate how contemporary artistic practices can reunify language, the body, and the environment. All of our works are developed through a rigorous and challenging processes that produce rich experiences for its growing audience. In 2008, The Prosodic Body repertoire includes: the installation An Anechoic Darkroom, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council (LMCC), 2008; The Extent to Which, a co-presentation with Danspace / Center for Performance Research, 2008; Re-English, a co-presentation with Movement Research Festival / LMCC, 2010; Working with Stockhausen’s Stimung 1968, presented by Danspace, (2010) and at Dance Theater Workshop (APAP 2011); and Target::furnace, at the Chocolate Factory, 2011.
THE COMMONS CHOIR has been presented at: Dixon Place; Movement Research Spring Festival co-presented with LMCC; Poetry Project copresented with Danspace; for the New Museum Festival of Ideas; and at the Harlem Stage (America Project produced by MAPP International). Lecture-demonstrations have been given in 2010-2011 at New York University, Harvard University, San Francisco State University, Michigan State University, and Rutgers University.
Our funding includes support from: The New York State Council on the Arts, the HipUp Foundation (Belgium), The Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, the American Music Center: Live Music for Dance Program, the James E. Robison Foundation, The Foundation for Contemporary Arts, and the Rubin Museum. Daria Faïn was the recipient of a fellowship from the French Ministry of Urbanism’s Architecture Research Section (1986). She has also received support from the French Ministry of Culture, the Foundation Cartier (Paris), the Ecole de Beaux Arts (Paris), MOD (France), and Danspace Project. Faïn was a Movement Research Artist in Residence, 2008-10.
Artist Statement
THE COMMONS CHOIR is the performative aspect of the Prosodic Body, a new field of research founded by Daria Fain and Robert Kocik, that explores language as sound, embodiment and utmost expression: tone, intention, rhythm, gesture, the tacit and evocation are all acts of prosody. The Prosodic Body is a practice that manifests in various areas: principally performance, architecture, health, education and socioeconomic justice. We are at once deeply committed to the cultural cruciality of poets and performers. We call this social aspect of our work 'commoning'. One branch of our commoning work is our COMMONS CHOIR, started in 2008. The choir draws upon the breadth of our prosody research to create performances that carry socially-charged issues. Typically, surrounding our choir events, we organize symposiums, talks and teach-ins covering matters such as income distribution, the history of the body, universal entitlement, usury laws, plebiscite, artificial scarcity, gratitude, levity, accumulation, economic growth and so on. Our intention is to both soothe America and imbue our language heretofore unheard of tones, moods, modes, hopes, admonishments and meanings.
