Open-Focus

This entry has been selected as a finalist in the
Art in Public: Expressing Youth Voices in Pittsburgh competition.

Posted on May 18, 2009 by Steve OHearn

About You

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Location

Project Street Address

c/o Kelly-Strayhorn Theater 5941 Penn Ave.

Project City

Pittsburgh

Project Province/State

Pennsylvania

Project Postal/Zip Code

15206

Project Country

United States

Your idea

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Name Your Project

Open-Focus

Describe Your Idea

Innovation

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What is your idea? What makes your project innovative? Why is it important?

We would like to create a public movie program, where neighborhood youths are interviewed about issues and interests that they would like to talk about, creating performances and visual art. This would be made into a movie projected onto urban surfaces at the scale of a drive-in. The public showings would be announced and the involved youths could invite anyone they know to the festive event, which would be free and unticketed. The youths would document their issues, locally and globally, with still photographs and prepare whatever they wanted for their segments. The showings would be urban scaled 24’x 30’ full images projected on a 15 K lumen projector, in an open area and usually right on the side of a light colored building at least 3 stories high, accessible, fun and friendly in tone. Open-focus would empower a group that can seldom get attention in a positive and healthy way, and initiate civic conversation between generations and groups.

Impact

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What will be the impact of your idea?

At each site we would ask youths to prepare to speak, on camera, to address their own neighborhood, but may also branch out into a wider world of interests. We would also pass out disposable cameras, and they could shoot photos of the area where they live, and things that might illustrate what they are talking about. We would encourage the use of humor and the arts to be part of their self-expression. We would document the subjects as they spoke at a central location- each segment would be authored by an individual. We would professionally edit these pieces. We may create transitions and funny interludes as is appropriate. Although most young people may want to talk, the project allows them to sing, perform instrumentally, rap, dance, show their own art works and personal graffiti to speak to the issues. This would add visual interest to the movie and let them actively participate in the creation of the movie’s content. We could even use their short videos.

What will it take to launch your idea? How will you secure community support and youth participation?

We would invite any youth group, art and performing groups, afterschool programs, and also individuals. There would be no preconceptions about what they talk (or dance, sing etc.) about. We want the larger community to come, and enjoy learning what the youths are interested in. We would choose public spaces within the community where audiences could bring lawn chairs and picnics, for the presentation. They would happen in the community in which the work is created and the youths live. It could be on the edge of a park or parking lot or church lawn, anywhere where there is room to gather and a high blank wall, and still is part of the neighborhood that it is created in. We would have to access 220 electric power and $25,000 in funding. We would do this in 3 regional sites in Pittsburgh. The Projects would be created in spring 2010, public showings in summer 2010.

This Entry is about (Issues)

Sustainability

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We are looking for ideas from people who can make them happen. Tell us about yourself or your team.

Squonk Opera creates accessible, original work by combining music and multimedia imagery with humor. Squonk Opera (wwww.squonkopera.org) has been presented across America and have toured internationally through Asia and Europe, where The Scotsman headlined "Insane Majesty!" Our work is “surreal and poetic” (USA Today) and “ingenious, hallucinatory, hypnotic” (NY Times). Squonk Opera has received over 75 grants and awards from organizations like the American Theater Wing, the NEA and Rockefeller M.A.P. Fund. Artistic Directors Jackie Dempsey and Steve O’Hearn have a desire to make interdisciplinary work that is accessible to a broad and diverse public. Recent shows have used interview documentation and large-scale outdoor projections, giving them the experience and capacity to complete "Open Focus." We have videotaped and performed with teens in 14 cities across the country in our Hometown series.