Take Some Leave Some

• • 3ARTS MATCH
  • 125% contributed

I am creating a collaborative, durational installation set inside a house on the South Side of Chicago that uses movement and performance to reflect on lessons learned and passed down to Black women. For one week in 2021, we will create a live-in residency and performance space during which we will be living in the house, “taking care of home,” and creating a multi-media performance that will run for three nights at the end of the week. My collaborators are Brianna Heath (Atlanta-based dancer, writer, and arts administrator) and Jovan Landry (Chicago-based emcee, videographer, and photographer). Together we will use the experience to explore who we are, who we desire to be, and our place in the world. As an artist and resident of the South Side of Chicago, I value art that exists for the people—art that recognizes the community as a part of the artistic process and invites them into the process. As a Black woman who grew up around many different Black women, I have always been inspired by our fortitude and continuous courage to be present in our bodies despite our hardships. Take Some Leave Some will create a space that acknowledges the Black women in our lives—their labor, courage, and wisdom even in their imperfections. By supporting this project, you will be an important part of furthering research into the relationship between movement and collective healing by centering and advocating for the voices and experiences of Black women artists.

About This Project

Choosing to create this work in a house on the South Side is intentional to bring awareness to the lack of performance spaces available to Black dance artists, as well as referencing “home” as a kind of safe space, a place for community where we learn foundational lessons and are taught to be resilient and unapologetic.

A year ago, I first collaborated with Brianna Heath to create a work-in-progress showing of Take Some Leave Some as a part of Links Hall’s Set Free program. The work came out of conversations we had about our experiences as Black women—our upbringings as preacher’s kids, sayings from our mothers and grandmothers—and how these things affect us as adults.

What does it look like to exist in a world where one experiences the double jeopardy of racism and sexism? What coping (and safety) mechanisms did our mothers and grandmothers directly and indirectly teach us as Black girls to prepare us for a world they knew didn’t love us? How do those lessons manifest in our bodies? To explore these questions, we used movement and a durational process.

With this new iteration, the ability to create our own residency space will give us more time to build choreographic scores, experiment with installation elements like objects from our childhood and writings, and work with a third collaborator, Jovan Landry, who will act as another performer, documenting the performance through film and photography, and creating a sound score.

Prior to moving into the house, we will be meeting over a period of 3-6 months to research, conduct movement rehearsals, and craft an outline for the performance. Once we move in, the residency and thus the “performance” will begin. The first half of the week will be spent reviewing our research and setting up various performance installations throughout the house using objects, film, and writing. There we will constantly be in a creative process, until the three-night premiere opens to the public on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.

Your contributions to support Take Some Leave Some will help pay artists for rehearsals and the one-week residency, cover costs of rehearsal spaces, artist travel between Chicago and Atlanta, costume and production costs, and renting the house.

Thank yous

Contribute any amount or choose from the levels below.

• $10
  Social media shout out ($10.00 is tax deductible.)
• $25
  Above plus your name acknowledged in the performance program book ($25.00 is tax deductible.)
• $45
  Above plus a thank you card ($45.00 is tax deductible.)
• $100
  Above plus a private video link to interviews with the creative team ($100.00 is tax deductible.)
• $200
  Above plus extra behind-the-scenes video outtakes and a Joy Bag filled with products from Black female entrepreneurs ($162.00 is tax deductible.)
• $300
  Above plus a handmade and personalized keepsake album with pictures from rehearsals, residency, and the performance ($207.00 is tax deductible.)

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Keyierra Collins

Walder Foundation Awardee

Keyierra Collins is an Afro-interdisciplinary dancer, choreographer, and teaching artist based in Chicago but recognized internationally. In 2020 she was awarded the 3Arts/ Walder Foundation Awardee grant. She graduated from Columbia College Chicago in 2016 with a BA in Dance …

View Keyierra Collins's profile

• 10 updates
• 107 supporters

• Update 1: Thanks to You!!

  Posted on September 02, 2020

   

  I cannot say thank you enough to all of the donors! With all of your support we have reached our initial goal of $5,000! Now we can reach our stretch goal of $7500! That is only $2,500 more...we can do this! The additional funding will allow us to go deeper into our research. My collaborators and myself will visit each other’s homes, spend time with our mothers, grandmothers, aunts, sisters. Then take time to share our experiences and reflect on how they have shaped us. I want this experience to be as authentic as possible with time spent in the process of making rather than only the finished product.

  Update 2: Meet My Collaborators!

  Posted on September 20, 2020

   

  Jovan Landry (@jlesliemonique) is a Chicago-based interdisciplinary artist who intentionally creates work that reflects an authentic representation of her community and the culture. Her approach is unconventional, collaborative, and eclectic. In Take Some Leave Some, Jovan will utilize film and photography for documentation & visual projections, and music production for its sound score.

  Update 3: Meet My Collaborators!

  Posted on September 21, 2020

   

  Brianna Alexis Heath is an Atlanta-based dancer, writer, and arts/culture organizer. Currently an MTS candidate at Candler School of Theology (Emory University), Bri's work is grounded in womanist theology, Black performance studies, and Blackpentecostal aesthetics. Bri is the co-founder of D'até Culture Foundation and the Beloved. Co.

  Update 4: Last Day!!!

  Posted on October 04, 2020

   

  WOW! We have made it to the last day of Take Some Leave Some crowdfunding campaign! I am so thankful to all the donors for supporting this project. I feel the support and love from you all! With 10 hours left...we are a few dollars away from making $6,000. We can do it!! Thank you again! 

  Update 5: Ready to Work!

  Posted on November 24, 2020

   

  Thanks to all of you, myself and my collaborators can now begin our work for Take Some Leave Some. Yesterday, we sat down to create a rehearsal schedule for this coming year. After reflecting and taking in account what does this project need, time, the effects of the pandemic, etc, we decided to push the premiere date to late spring or early summer of 2022. This project is very special and I want to take the right amount of time to develop it. In the meantime please look out for updates of our process. Also we are in the process of creating an instagram page to archive our research. Thank you again...I look forward to sharing!

  Update 6: Instagram Page is Up!

  Posted on December 05, 2020

   

  Hello Donors!

  The Take Some Leave Some instagram page is officially active. This page will be used more so as an archival space. There is no expectations for a regular update. Again, this is just an archival space to hold bits and pieces of our research process, pleasurable moments, ideas that connected to the work, and...whatever we want ?. I hope it will make you feel closer to the piece, traveling on the journey with us! Be on the lookout for a follow request!

   

  I'm on Instagram as @takesome.leavesome. Install the app to follow my photos and videos. https://www.instagram.com/invites/contact/?i=dhe8y5qkkcr8&utm_content=khkg2bp

   

  Best,

  Take/Leave Team

  Update 7: Hi Take Leave Family!

  Posted on May 24, 2021

   

  It has been awhile since our last update! I do apoligize, we have been working very hard. With your support, my collaborators and myself were able to successfully fund our research process and it has been an amzing journey! That being said, we originally planned to premire Take Some Leave Some this summer 2021. However, I want to truly give this work the space and time that it deserves. Currently I am looking for more funding to make Take/Leave something you can be very proud of. Thank you for your paitents, support, and trusting our procees. Don't forget to check out our instagram page to follow the project. Talk soon! 

  Update 8: Where we are!

  Posted on August 23, 2021

  

   

  A Love Offering

  Hi Family! It has been awhile since our last update. We are very close to getting the funding we need for the next phase of this project. In the meantime keep following our process on our instagram page @takesome.leavesome. Look out for a short excerpt called A Love Offering. Thank you all for your patience and support! We'll talk soon!

  https://www.instagram.com/takesome.leavesome/

   

  Update 9: A Love Offering

  Posted on August 23, 2021

  

   
  Update 10: A Love Offering

  Posted on August 23, 2021

  

   

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