The MDC LIVE ARTS LAB is a professional development laboratory for locally-based working artists in dance, music, moving image, performance, visual and literary arts. MDC LIVE ARTS LAB seeks to foster and nurture Miami’s performing arts community through intensive summer training alongside Master level practitioners and an inter/national creative discourse. MDC LIVE ARTS LAB culminates in a public workshop performance. The 2014 LIVE ARTS LAB guest artist is multidisciplinary performer Baba Israel.

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About Baba Israel

Raised in New York by theatre parents who were core members of the famous Living Theatre, Baba Israel had proximity to theatre on the edge from early in his life. As a young artist he began exploring spoken word, Hip Hop, and experimental performance. Later he lived in Australia where he co-founded the group Meta Bass ‘n Breath and worked on major community theatre projects, Hip Hop festivals. He has toured as MC, beatboxer, and theatre artist across North and South America, Europe, Africa, Australia and Asia.

His solo show Boom Bap Meditations was awarded support by the Ford Foundation and The Hip Hop Theatre Festival. Baba Israel is proud to have shared the stage with artists such as Outkast, The Roots, Rahzel, Lester Bowie, Afrika Bambaataa, Vernon Reid, and Bill Cosby. Previous directorial work includes the Project 2050 (New World Theatre), Countryboy Struggle (Maxwell Golden) and Sharpening SAWDS. He has worked on sound design for theatre and dance projects with Renita Martin’s It is the Seeing and Rha Goddess. He was co-founder and Artistic Director of Playback NYC Theatre Company which brought theatre to prisons, hospitals, shelters, and arts venues. As an educator he has worked internationally developing projects with young people. He holds an MFA in Interdisciplinary Arts from Goddard College. He became Artistic Director/CEO of Contact in 2009, after several years of performing and leading workshops at the venue as a visiting artist. Baba Israel lives in New York where he continues to develop projects in theatre, music, and education.

Course Philosophy

We live in a time of gentrification, over stimulation, and endless information. How do we curate our own archives? Who are the mentors, muses, and family that we want to honor, preserve, or better yet be transformed by?

My earliest years were spent with experimental and political ensemble, the Living Theatre. My parents were core members of the company and then made the decision not to raise me on the road. My father, Steve Ben Israel, became a solo artist bringing together his experience as a jazz musician, theatre performer, and stand up comic. His work evolved into what he called “performance life”. He would develop material at parties, in conversations, on the corner, and utilize his creative impulses in the everyday venues of parks, post offices, subways, and taxis. He found his stories, his jokes, and his humor in these lived experiences and brought them to the stage. He was searching for and creating Utopian moments, moments of transformation, of resistance and collective resilience.

My own process and philosophy has been greatly influenced by his approach. I learned early that an interdisciplinary approach could transform how we create work. My work is also influenced by the Hip Hop aesthetics of sampling and remixing. In the LIVE ARTS LAB we will explore personal narrative and how we bring our lives on stage. We will look at how we can consciously bring our deeper artistic impulses out into the world and how that can influence and generate the content of our work. We will explore writing, spoken word, verse, as well as creating text through improvisation, recording, and collaboration.

We will explore how we can sample and remix archive material to animate and dialogue with the past. We will explore how technology can aid us in this process and how to best integrate it into our work.

Lab Schedule

Payment 

The fee for the Live Arts Lab is $350. This can be paid by cash, check or credit card. To pay in person, please call our office at 305-237-3010 to make arrangements. Checks may be mailed to our office at MDC Live Arts, 300 NE Second Avenue, Miami, FL 33132.

Work Study 

A few work study opportunities are available for the 2014 Live Arts Lab. This arrangement provides for 50% reduction on the Lab fee ($175) in exchange for 15 hours of help to MDC Live Arts throughout the 2014-2015 season. Projects work study participants will work on include ushering and office work. To be considered for a work study position, please additionally attach a statement of need and a copy of the first page of your most recent tax return.

Scholarships 

Limited need-based full scholarships are available. To be considered for a scholarship, please additionally attach a statement of need and a copy of the first page of your most recent tax return