About The Project

     Life Theater is a performance art piece which combines the spontaneous world in which we live with the planned world of theater. What seem to be everyday activities to unsuspecting onlookers are actually thought out, planned performances by ArtWorks artists. Life Theater was a temporary project that took place over the course of 5 days during the summer of 2014. The widely celebrated experiential artist Lee Walton lead 8 ArtWorks Apprentices to complete this temporary piece. The team made several appearances at various parks throughout the city including: Washington Park, Owl’s Nest Park, and Ault Park.

 

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Project Team

Lead Artist: Lee Walton

Apprentice Team: Sydney Barth, Thomas Clifford, Caleb Leonard, Josephine Masset, Ryan Murphy, Terrance Norris, Hannah Perrino, Tenley Rissover

Length of Project: 5 days,  summer 2014

Locations: Washington Park, Owl’s Nest Park, Ault Park

Generously Funded By: Kroger, Cincinnati Contemporary Arts Center

 

Life Theater Hot Dog Stand

    Lee Walton has performed Life Theater in several cities around the country. For this particular variation, Apprentices gave away free hot dogs with wrappers containing phrases describing people and actions. As customers received the hot dogs and read the phrases, Apprentices acted out the very descriptions being read.  At the start of the project, the Apprentices constructed and painted the vibrant Life Theater storefront. Then, the team prepared the hot dog wrappers by stamping them with events such as, “Boy with red ball is lost” that the Apprentices were to act out as the customer read it. Once all the preparations were completed, the team set up the hot dog stand at three different parks in Cincinnati and the performance began. As customers enjoyed the free hot dogs they began to notice that seemingly ordinary people in the park were actually ArtWorks artists performing specific actions! The most successful appearance was during Lumenocity at Washington Park, the team was constantly stamping the hot dog wrappers with the events, and had a continuous line for the free hot dogs.

 

 

 

 

 

 

A BIG THANKS TO OUR
ONGOING FUNDERS