More text and images from this work can be found here.

Redactions began with a fanciful notion: what if I could ask an abstract form—what exactly are you saying? I turned this into an assignment—loosen the mind that makes shapes and colors and ask it to pour out, to lay out their meanings into words. Then place them side by side, abstract form and supposed meaning.

And why redaction? A redaction announces that something has been covered over, erased, obscured. If I won’t say it, at least I wear the marks of what I won’t reveal. Redactions are in the air too, aren’t they? They mark our times—unspoken, possibly unspeakable acts covered over more or less successfully.

Redactions is both an expanding collection of text drawings (watercolor and ink on paper) and the performance that results from them. Following a residency period at The Chocolate Factory, Levine will present a choreographed reading of a selection of the Redactions. The performance coincides with the publication of a portfolio of the Redactions, which will be launched with an exhibition at the new Chocolate Factory space in Spring 2020. The Chocolate Factory event will be the first stop in a “performance book tour” through cities in the US, Canada and Mexico.

Residency will take place at The Chocolate Factory Theater.

Created by Abigail Levine in collaboration with Paula Matthusen, Kristopher K.Q. Pourzal and Samuel Wentz.