Processional Arts Workshop
Who We Are
Processional Arts Workshop grew out of a collaboration between Alex Kahn, Sophia Michahelles and a group of volunteers who came together in 1998 to create the opening puppet performance for NY's 25th Annual Village Halloween Parade. They have continued to explore and push the boundaries of processional art ever since. Deeply influenced by Carnival traditions and global rituals of celebration, they have designed and developed over 100 site-specific art parades, carnivalesque performances and puppetscapes. Each project is a collaboration with local residents, and most involve volunteers at every stage of production to tell a story of that community. Over the past few decades, they have worked with thousands of volunteers to create human-powered performances in public spaces around the world. Processional Arts Workshop became non-profit, federally tax-exempt 501(c)3 organization in 2009.
ARTISTIC DIRECTORS
Alex Kahn
is co-founder and director of Processional Arts Workshop. Throughout his evolving practice a director, performance designer, installation artist, printmaker, and puppeteer he has maintained a keen interest in how community-centered ritual traditions can convey complex, contemporary, and local narratives. After graduating from Harvard's program in Visual and Environmental Studies, Kahn traveled to Nepal on a one-year Gardner Fellowship to explore Buddhist festival structures and iconography. His interest in global masquerade traditions led him to study Trinidad Carnival on a Fulbright Fellowship and traditional "wild-man" processions in rural Croatia (with Michahelles) at the Kamov Residency Program in Rijeka. An avid collaborator, he has created performing objects and environments for Meredith Monk and Pauline Oliveros, performed in Ragnar Kjartenssen's "The Visitors", and worked as in-house production designer at the Kitchen Performance Center in New York. Alex has exhibited widely and chaired the Printmaking department at Maine College of Art. He is a member the the Hudson River Ice Yacht Club and Jumbo Yams Ultimate Frisbee. He currently lives and works with Sophia Michahelles in a historic milk-barn with their daughter in NY's Hudson Valley.
Sophia Michahelles
is co-founder and director of Processional Arts Workshop. She has been designing performances and processions in public space for over 25 years, inspired by an interest in architecture, human-build environments and the people who live in them. She grew up in an international family in France, Italy and the US. Her curiosity and ease with different cultures formed her ability to translate them into a visual and performative form, central to her practice as a processional artist. She started working in theater design and puppetry while studying Art History at McGill University. She has received numerous awards and residencies for her work, including a CEC Arts Fellowship in Ukraine, a Kamov Artist Residency in Croatia and a CCA7 residency in Trinidad. Michahelles performed as an aquatic puppeteer with Basil Twist's Obie-award winning Symphonie Fantastique for a decade and designed Futurist-inspired costumes for theater and clothes for the everyday. Sophia and Alex are based in the Hudson Valley, living and working in a historic barn along with their daughter and various other creatures.
What We Do
Working together to create artful procession can transform a community. It strengthens human connections and deepens an understanding of shared space. Here are ways we PAW can collaborates with you :
ARTISTS in RESIDENCE:
PAW will work with your community to design and build a procession that evokes uniquely local stories, issues, or a collective imaginative vision. The occasion might be for the opening of a public space, a town's anniversary, public outreach from a cultural organization, or just because the place you live is worth reflecting on and celebrating. We work with a host organization to develop a plan, conduct research, brainstorm with local residents and stakeholders, and ultimately design visual elements, movement, and even sound. We lead one or more weeks of collaborative workshops to produce a unique, human-powered performance.
MASTER-CLASSES and CONSULTATIONS:
We lead 1-day and 2-day intensive master-classes to help teaching artists bring new ways of building procession to their classrooms and communities. We can address broad design and organizational strategies, or delve into detailed hands-on instruction in specific techniques, covering topics that include pageant puppetry, illuminated forms, ceremonial architecture, mask-making and sound. We can also guide community organizers in best practices for activating public space, including volunteer coordination, route design, choreography, and communication strategies.
PUBLIC ART and THEATRICAL COMMISSIONS:
We can custom-design and fabricate giant puppets, lanterns, body-extensions, or other visual elements for public spaces, local festivals, parades, or on-stage theatrical performances. We lead on-site training sessions in assembly and movement for volunteers and technical staff.
Past PAW clients include the Obama White House, NYC's Civic Engagement Commission, Walk with Amal, Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Raynham Hall Museum, Norton Museum of Art, Ward Melville Heritage Trust, Two Bridges Marco Polo Day Festival, HERE Arts Center, and Winnakee Land Trust.
ARTIST TALKS:
Want to learn more about processional art? We love to share reflections and respond to questions about our work and our exploration of Carnivalesque cultures worldwide. We tailor each presentation to the interests, age-level, and needs of each new audience.
When & Where to Find Us
Here is a calendar of upcoming public projects! Stay tuned here and on FB and IG feeds for updates and more details,
or subscribe to PAW's Annual Newsletter and occasional special event bulletins (only a few per year)
Highland Lights: Microcosmos
Garrison, NY
Procession: April 26
Workshops: March 22 – April 13
A nocturnal foray into the understory of woodland insects. Illuminated puppets bring Humble Bee Hollow's pathways to life, highlighting the overlooked and imperiled keystone species upon whom life on earth depends.
Annual Mad Hatters' Parade
Hudson, NY
May 10
Anyone can join our Spring sashay of wearable art, reveling in Hudson's past and evolving future as a city of makers.
MadHattersParade.org
The Great Pollinator Ramble
Wave Hill. Bronx, NY.
June 7–8
10 key species of Hudson Valley pollinator inhabit the spectacular gardens at Wave Hill. Guided by a habitat map and Life List, visitors are enticed to wander in search of local bees, butterflies, beetles, and bird hidden amidst the spring foliage.
Pop-up Invertebrate puppet workshop at Soil Fest
White Feather Farm. Saugerties NY
July 26
What might you find in a handful of earth? PAW leads ongoing workshops for making simple segmented insects, millipedes, and other critical invertebrate soil-dwellers from low-tech or up-cycled materials. The workshop will culminate in a fun mini-procession through the grounds of White Feather Farm.
Stay tuned for more details at whitefeatherfarm.org
Morningside Lights
Harlem, NY
Procession: September 20
Lantern workshops: September 13–19
Our annual giant lantern procession, built in a week of intensely collaborative workshops, explores themes that range from Utopian architecture, to the Harlem Rennaissance, to the re-imagining of urban monuments. In collaboration with Columbia University's Miller Theater and Friends of Morningside Park.
NY's Village Halloween Parade
Greenwich Village, NYC.
October 31
Opening performance for the Parade, built for 26 years (!) in collaborative Puppetraisings held every weekend in October at PAW in Barrytown, NY.
WinteRamble
Lincoln Square neighborhood, NYC
December 17
An austere hibernal neo-tradition returns to NYC streets with 14-foot tall Frost Giants, Kalimbascopes, and community-made ice-lanterns.