In 1999, Peculiar Works Project asked Funkopolis to create a new work for the unique, one-time-only festival called the Judson House Project. The festival celebrated the history and legacy of the famed Judson House -- an artistic space which launched the careers of Merce Cunningham, Robert Rauschenberg, John Cage, Claes Oldenberg, Yoko Ono, Carolee Schneeman, Jim Dine, Maria Irene Fornes, Rosalyn Drexler, Sam Shepard and others -- before its demolition by New York University.

Funkopolis' contribution to the Judson House Project was called rite #55/wonderwall elegy. It closed the festival each evening, and was the final performance ever given in the Judson House.

Funkopolis was thrilled and honored to be the final performers. We treasure the memory of The Judson House, and keep its creative spirit alive inside us.
The Judson House Project
Judson House Gallery, New York City, USA
June 27-30, 2000
The Debussy Tim Brown
The Rimbaud Nicholas Buonagurio
The Sackville-West Shannon Maddox
The Delacroix Gabriel Shanks

Costume Design Shannon Maddox

Directors Gabriel Shanks and Tim Brown
Playwrights Gabriel Shanks and Tim Brown
Festival Producers: Barry Rowell, Catherine Porter, and Ralph Lewis
Production Photography Gabriel Shanks
Costume Design Shannon Maddox
Sound Design Tim Brown and Gabriel Shanks
Scenic Design created by the cast and altered during performances
Music The Art of Noise

Last performance ever in the Judson Gallery. Funkopolis considers this the greatest honor of the company's career.

  • Part of the famed Judson Memorial Church, just off Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village, the Judson House was home to some of the most groundbreaking visual and performance art of the 20th century. Rauschenberg, Oldenburg, Cage, Cunningham, Ono, Fornes, Shepard, and Tavel all staged or exhibited seminal works there; Al Carmines' famed musicals What Happened and Asphodel, with librettos by Gertrude Stein, also premiered at Judson.
  • Bought by New York University, the Judson House was scheduled for demolition in August 2000. On the building's final weekend, eight groups of artists moved into various spaces in the building with original, site-specific works that honored the history and the creativity of Judson House.
  • Funkopolis performed in the famed Judson Gallery, which the ensemble turned into a performance installation/theatre piece. The audience entered a darkened closet, only to find drilled holes that looked through into the main Gallery. On that other side was a room illuminated by hundreds of candles, where four shadowy figures continued to make art, read texts, and drill. Audiences were given a piece of Judson's very own architecture home with them. Audience members also had the opportunity to write thoughts directly on the Judson House walls.
Performance Text, in its entireity

(Text was spoken improvisationally and mixed-up by the cast as they performed their gestural sequences in the room.)

Stories upon stories upon stories.

And it was raining...

They sighed. They whispered. They fainted.

Wait for something extraordinary to happen. (You just missed it.)

Even in the written word there is always a gap.

Bridged by the imagination.

Okay. I get it.

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