Performance
A Score of Scores

10 artists. 10 score writers. A score is an old term for ‘twenty’ of something = A Score of Scores.

ARTISTS & SCORE WRITERS
Abedar Kamgari & Naseh Kamgari
Holly Timpener & Enok Ripley
James Knott & Francisco-Fernando Granados
Keith Cole & David Roche
Laura Paolini & Tomasz Szrama
Mikiki & Jan Peacock
Paul Couillard & Elvira SantamarĂ­a-Torres
Rita Camacho Lomeli & Alejandro Tamayo
SA Smythe & Autumn Knight
Tanya Mars & Myriam Laplante

Put together by Shannon Cochrane and Francesco Gagliardi

FADO’s spring performance art series invites 10 artists to perform the interpretation of a performance score, written for them by an artist of their own choosing. Artists from across a spectrum of practices grounded in live performance (including cabaret, music, experimental composition, intermedia, video and more) interpret a score designed for them by an array of Canadian and international artists. The duos have chosen to strategize their collaboration in myriad ways—from conspiring together to revealing the final score only moments before the live presentation.

Emerging in the early 1960s in the context of the FLUXUS movement and in conversation with the expanded compositional practices of John Cage and LaMonte Young, “event scores” relied on elements of collaboration, improvisation, and chance to challenge traditional understandings of originality and artistic creation. Often very short, event scores typically consisted of lists of prompts and instructions ranging from the mundane to the elusively abstract and were circulated among fellow artists with an open invitation to interpret and perform them however they wanted. 

A Score of Scores is an experimental back-to-basics platform for artists to create new small-scale work in a spirit of experimentation, collaboration, and agility.

PROGRAM
May 12, 2023 @ 7:00pm: James Knott, Tanya Mars
May 13, 2023 @ 7:00pm: Keith Cole, Laura Paolini
May 18, 2023 @ 7:00pm: Paul Couillard, Holly Timpener
May 19, 2023 @ 7:00pm: Mikiki, SA Smythe
May 20, 2023 @ 7:00pm: Rita Camacho Lomeli, Abedar Kamgari

Artist
Laura Paolini

© Laura Paolini, Make Your Bed, 2020. Photograph Adrienne Row-Smith.

Canada
www.laurapaolini.com

My practice stands between historical interrogation, personal experience, and the conceptual trajectories of contemporary art. I am interested in complex overlaps and fleshy folds: the space where the “political” person and “personal” person meet, merge and overlay. My work’s exploration concentrates on performative actions and the methods we use to engage with objects and spaces. Throughout my practice, bodies and objects work together as a scale, not exclusively measuring distance through space and time, but also a scale that includes functions, habits, and the conditioning of a body through these means.

Laura Paolini (she/her) currently lives in Ottawa, unceded and unsurrendered Anishinaabe Algonquin territory. Her artwork is primarily conceptual and manifests through installations, videos, and performances, often unfolding where these forms meet, merge and collapse. She has exhibited in various Canadian institutions including Hamilton Artists Inc, The Ottawa Art Gallery, and Art MĂ»r during the 17th edition of Fresh Paint/New Construction (2021). She recently performed during PERF; a performance art Biennale hosted by AXENÉO7 (evening curated by Anna Khimasia and Thomas Grondin). Paolini earned an MFA from the Department of Visual Arts at the University of Ottawa (2021). In addition to previously published writing, she is currently a member of the editorial committee for Peripheral Review, an independent platform for critical and experimental art writing in Canada. Her video works are distributed through Vtape (Toronto).

Artist Orange

Just as a performance artist uses their body as their medium, this is a fragrance composed entirely of the orange tree: fruit, leaves, bark, roots, and flowers. Artist Orange performs itself.

Top Notes

neroli, blood orange

Middle Notes

fresh orange juice, petit grain

Base Notes

orange twig, orange seed