FROM UN-[TITLED]: PART 1, AT INSCAPE

SCENE 2

ASSAY

(JUSTIN + 20 AUDIENCE members)

GENERAL NOTE: An immersive multi-site-specific project in Seattle that focused on the ways in which communities are displaced by, and resist gentrification. The scene below was written for Seattle’s historic INS building, a former Assay Office, Immigration and Naturalization Services building, detention center, and current artist studios. The scene is written to engage directly with audiences. More at UN-[TITLED].

First time: AUDIENCE (GROUP #2) is led by JUSTIN at the start of the performance from the Lobby (Level 1) up Right Stairwell to the 4th Floor, just outside the Assay Office.

Second Time: AUDIENCE (GROUP #1) is led by AKOIYA out of the INSTALLATION Sequence (Level 1) up the Right Stairwell to just outside the Assay Office.

JUSTIN (Arriving with or receiving AUDIENCE outside Assay Office): So, here we are outside of Nate Gowdy’s studio. These are some of Nate’s portraits, including this one of Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal and this one of Aleksa Manila, serving up American Superhero Realness. Aleksa, by the way, is a genderqueer performer, therapist and healthcare worker here in Seattle who immigrated from the Philippines through this very building. Congresswoman Jayapal also immigrated to the United States through this building. Now, before this was an art studio it was part of Immigration and Naturalization Services like most of the spaces in the building, but before it was part of INS, it housed an Assay office. Does anyone know what an assay office is? (JUSTIN pauses for responses, ad-lib as needed, acknowledging, and responding to AUDIENCE). Well, it has to do with gold. Gold that was taken from the Yukon and Alaska, from the land of the Tlingit, the Koyukon, and the Han, was brought here to have its value assayed… and the U.S. Government would pay prospectors for the gold. Simple process for the prospectors and assay officers. But for Native peoples back in the Yukon, the processes for removing gold from the land meant a drastic reduction in moose, caribou, and the destruction of salmon streams. For the Han, it meant displacement and disease. From stolen lands, these stolen goods were brought here to have their worth weighed and evaluated on land which was also stolen from the Indigenous peoples of this area, the Coastal Salish, Suquamish, Stillaguamish, Muckleshoot, and Duwamish. The simple exchange this office represented also represented the exchange of a complex system of consequences. (Opens studio door). Now, back here is a room where they kept the gold…. (Opens studio door and leads audience through, says hi to Nate if he’s around… then gesturing into the vault) If you’d like to pass by this doorway and take a peek, it’s that little room back there. (Lead them to the vault and then corral them back) Oh, and while you’re in there, will each of you bring back a bag or item from the lighted shelf? OK, let’s gather back over here where we can all see. As I was saying… precious materials were brought here to be tested, weighed and evaluated. (Big change in tone. Putting the clipboard down. Now “off-book” and setting up the scale.) But how can you truly weigh any of this? (Taking a couple of the items from the AUDIENCE) The value of extracted resources against the wealth of undisturbed ecosystems? The weight of removal against refuge? (Gesturing to the bags and boxes while opening the ones taken) Go ahead, open those… (Reaching for items, speaking and weighing things, imbuing each item with meaning, lulling into autohypnosis.) The weight of a heart against a feather. A song against a fist.A joyous body against a darkening sky (Placing more and more weights on each side) The weight of waiting… and waiting… and waiting… (Removing those weights in a way that makes the scales rock) And rocking… and rocking… (Trying to balance it) And hoping, and balancing, and working, and breathing… The weight of these binaries against non-binaries. Hmmmm. Tricky, that makes a binary. Maybe scales aren’t right for this. (JUSTIN steps back and assays/assesses. Pauses, then begins to dismantle the scale in silence and stack box on clipboard… scoops up the rocks and begins to move to a new location) C’mon… this way… (Leads AUDIENCE to first mandala, which is only just begun, adds to it, using rocks to emphasize and illustrate idea) We start as a single cell (places a single pebble) and divide (places another), or rather expand, a zygote at the beginning of mitosis. (Arranging the river rocks into a constellation artwork, a mandala, on a table or windowsill or floor, punctuating what follows with each placement) Become a body, heart, mind, spirit, soul, person… family, community, tribe, a people, a people among other creatures, in relationship to the earth, solar system, in constellation to galaxies, a universe… a universe among many… (Leads AUDIENCE tonext mandala which is ornately arranged, and begins to tend it, tidy it, care for it, prune it). As artists, as visitors, as taxpayers, as community members … do we naturalize as was done in this building, as a legalistic process, or to the land itself, not owners but stewards (Looking for perfect place for last rock and setting it into the formation) in right relationship to one another. And then… (gestures to follow him and leads to third mandala which is in ruin) In all the building and unbuilding and rebuilding… Where am I and where are you? (selects two pebbles from within the mandala) … within the matrix of gentrification, of displacement, and of naturalization (again, punctuating each word with a pebble and handing them to different AUDIENCE)? Does our presence together now, intervene or enable? How do we give and receive, reclaim and replenish…. What do we carry with us? (Pressing stones into AUDIENCES’ hands, encourage them to take a stone from the rubble pile, which will go with AUDIENCE and factor later again at WaNaWari in the building of a cairn. Whatever AUDIENCE decides is fine, to take or to return the stone to the pile. In second iteration of scene JUSTIN takes three stones in his pocket for each PERFOMER to place at WaNaWari). Keep those safe and bring them along. (JUSTIN leads AUDIENCE out. Warmly, seeing AUDIENCE and gesturing to follow). Onward… (If first group, JUSTIN leads AUDIENCE GROUP #2 to Left Stairwell to look down from 4th Floor to STAIRWELL TRIO. If second group JUSTIN leads AUDIENCE GROUP #1, all the way down Right Stairwell back to Lobby on Floor 1 to finish and queue up for shuttle bus).

END OF SCENE

ASSAY

Night Riders

Riposa