Tania El Khoury’s work focuses on audience interactivity and is concerned with the ethical and political potential of such encounters. She creates installations and performances in which the audience is an active collaborator. Her solo work has toured internationally and has been awarded the Anti Festival’s International Prize for Live Art, the Total Theatre Innovation Award, and the Arches Brick Award. She holds a PhD from Royal Holloway, University of London. Her research and publications focus on the political potential of interactive live art. El Khoury is associated with Forest Fringe collective of artists in the UK and is a co-founder of Dictaphone Group in Lebanon, a research and performance collective aiming at questioning our relationship to the city and its public space. Learn more about the artist at taniaelkhoury.com.
Dictaphone Group is a research and performance collective that creates live art events based on multidisciplinary study of space. It is a collaborative project initiated by live artist Tania El Khoury and architect/urbanist Abir Saksouk. Together along with various collaborators such as performance artist and producer Petra Serhal, they have been creating site specific performances informed by research in a variety of places like a cable car, a fisherman’s boat, and a discontinued bus. The aim of these projects is to question our relationship to the city, and redefine its public space. Learn more at dictaphonegroup.com.
Abir Saksouk (Camp Pause, designer of Tell Me What I Can Do, co-founder of Dictaphone Group) is an architect and urbanist. She has been involved in several research projects in Lebanon, including the history of informal suburbs, the social production of shared spaces in the city, and more recently housing rights in Beirut. She is interested in exploring how community engagement could be employed in planning and actively shaping the future of cities. She is the co-founder of Dictaphone Group and Public Works Studio (2012).
Petra Serhal (Stories of Refuge) is a performance maker and actress who regularly collaborates with artists and filmmakers. In 2010, she started her collaboration with Dictaphone Group. Petra is interested in the performativity of the choreographed body, the representation of the violated body, as well as creating interactive spaces with the audience. She recently published an essay, “Beware of the Image,” in Ibraaz.
Basel Zaraa (As Far As My Fingertips Take Me) is a spoken word artist and percussionist who writes about themes of exile and resistance. He has collaborated with a wide range of international artists including Akala, Guildhall youth project (Im)possibilities, Palestinian hip-hop group Katibeh Khamseh, Arabic fusion band Raast and funk band Shokunin. He is part of the cast of PsycheDELIGHT’s Borderline satire about the Calais camp, in which he performs original music and DIY sound effects. He is also a visual and stencil graffiti artist.
Lisa Kraus, Project Director, has worked for over forty years in the arts as a performer, choreographer, teacher, restager, writer, and curator. She is dedicated to providing a surround for artists’ work that includes knowledgeable writing, the participation of appropriate experts in related fields, and audience experiences that awaken deeper ways of seeing and connecting.
Pepón Osorio, Project Consultant, is a professor in Community Arts Practice at Temple University. He has worked with well over 25 communities across the U.S. and internationally, creating installations based on real life experiences. This experience made him an ideal partner in conceptualizing the new installation, Tell Me What I Can Do.
Hazami Sayed, Project Advisor, is the founder and executive director of Al-Bustan Seeds of Culture, dedicated to presenting and teaching Arab culture through the arts and language. Al-Bustan is producing (Dis)placed, new works in response to the Syrian refugee crisis and gentrification.
ear – whispered Artists and Staff
Tania El Khoury, Featured Artist
Lisa Kraus, Project Director
Sara Nye, Project Manager
Amelia Couderc, Project Assistant
Lauren Tracy, Project Production Manager with Flannel & Hammer Scene Shop
Jon Weary, Installation Coordinator for Tell Me What I Can Do
Basel Zaraa, Performer in As Far As My Fingertips Take Me
Naya Salamé, Production Assistant for Gardens Speak
Abir Saksouk, Designer of Tell Me What I Can Do, Co-Founder of Dictaphone Group
Pepón Osorio, Artistic Consultant
Hazami Sayed, Advisor, Executive Director/Founder of Al-Bustan Seeds of Culture
Louis Massiah, Consultant, Executive Director of Scribe Video Center
Josh Mcllvain, Content Editor (website and print) and Marketing Advisor
Sharene Azimi, Communications Consultant with Mission Communications
Masters Group Design, Graphic Designer
Sean Brodbeck, Web Designer with Sean Brodbeck Graphic & Interactive Design
Dave Tavani, Videographer
Johanna Austin, Photographer
Bryn Mawr College Arts Program Staff
Lisa Kraus, Performing Arts Coordinator
Angela Dowdy, Arts Administrator
Justin McDaniel, Technical Director
Amy Radbill, Production Manager
Bryn Mawr College Partnering Faculty and Staff
Carrie Robbins, Curator & Academic Liaison for Art and Artifact Collections
Laurel McLaughlin, Ridgway Curatorial Fellow to Special Collections and PhD student, History of Art
Alicia Walker, Associate Professor of History of Art, Director of the Middle Eastern Studies Program, and Director of the Center for Visual Culture
Dawn DiGiovanni, Associate Director of Facilities for Grounds
Bryn Mawr College Project Interns
Rachel Adler
Akili Davis
Tanjuma Haque
Maryam Jahanbin
Claire Knight
Dalia Mahgoub
Talia Shiroma
MacK Somers
Maya Stucky
FringeArts Staff
Zach Blackwood, Artistic Producer
Keighty McLallen, Interim Production Manager
Raina Searles, Marketing Manager
Sabrina Carter, Festival Communications Coordinator
Christopher Munden, Guide & Information Manager
Bryn Mawr College Arts Program Faculty
Mark Lord, Alice Carter Dickerman Director of the Arts Program and Professor of the Arts on the Theresa Helburn Chair of Drama and Director of the Theater Program
Linda Caruso Haviland, Director and Professor of Dance
Dan Torday, Director and Associate Professor of Creative Writing
Madeline Cantor, Associate Director of Dance
Dee Matthews, Assistant Professor of Creative Writing
Catharine Slusar, Assistant Professor in Theater
Maiko Matsushima, Lecturer and Designer, Theater