PHYSICAL PLASTIC is a composer-performer collaboration creating sound-theatre at the intersection of theatricality and artistic action. Lately, our research is driven by a reciprocal dramaturgical rhythm with autobiography at the center, where the performance becomes a vessel for the political and personal interests of each collaborator. Our approach is based on the marriage of visual arts with the time-based arts of music and text and the concrete possibilities of this interdisciplinarity; and upon the body’s capacity to make immanent issues of universal concern. Our work requires the essential presence and function of the physical performer, who is able to respond to the possibilities of the stage with a spatial and sensual expressivity that reveals new relations of sound, gesture and voice.
KESTREL FARIN LEAH is an interdisciplinary performer and theatre artist and co-founder of Physical Plastic theatre project with composer and sound artist Yiannis Christofides. She holds an MFA in Acting from California Institute of the Arts (US) and a BS in Film and Television Production from Boston University (US).
Kestrel has shown original work at Los Angeles venues such as: REDCAT; Human Resources; Blue Roof Studios; and Concord Space, as well as Theatro Polis/NiMAC (CY); The Vail International Film Festival (US) and The Garage (US). She is a recipient of the New Music USA award for Physical Plastic’s devised work ALARM and a Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grant for the solo work Touch(ed). She has participated in residencies including: The Watermill Center (US); Passerelle Centre d’art contemporain (FR); Knockdown Center (US); Theatro Polis/NiMAC (CY); and Cyprus Chamber of Fine Arts (CY).
Kestrel has performed in such venues and festivals as Lincoln Center (US); REDCAT (US); 3LD (US); Los Angeles Contemporary Museum of Art (US); DO DISTURB at Palais de Tokyo (FR); Le Grand Palais (FR); Centre Pompidou, Malaga (ES); Nicosia International Festival (CY); Theatro Polis/NiMAC (CY); Denver Art Museum (US); BlackTina Festival (US); LAX Festival (US); Fahrenheit/FLAX Foundation (US); and Irondale Center (US).
Among the artists she has collaborated with are WaxFactory theater company, B. Dunn Movement, and LIDA Project; directors such as Paris Erotokritou, Maureen Huskey, Zoe Aja Moore, Kim Rubenstein, Kameron Steele, and Sheila Vand; and visual artists Julie Bena, Patty Chang, Dara Friedman, Emily Mast, Liz Toonkel, and Duchamp-prize-winner Julien Previeux (Kestrel was a primary collaborator on the awarded work What Shall We Do Next).
She dedicated 10 years to the Suzuki Method of Actor Training in the US and Japan, and currently studies annually in Athens under Theodoros Terzopoulos, whose methods she teaches. She has taught for institutions such as Open Up EU; CalArts; The Watermill Center, and Cyprus Chamber of Fine Arts.
Kestrel’s writing on performance has been published in Riting journal and The Theatre Times, and will be included in the upcoming book BEING WORK by Insert Blanc Press.
YIANNIS CHRISTOFIDES combines practices in electronic music, soundscape composition, creative sound design and field recording and has a background in media theory, communication and cultural studies.
His music and soundscapes for art installations, performance, and curatorial projects have been presented at leading venues and institutions throughout Europe and the U.S including Venice Biennale (IT), Centre Pompidou (FR), Lincoln Center (US), The Watermill Center (US), The Athens & Epidaurus Festival (GR), La Triennale di Milano (IT), New York City Electroacoustic Music Festival (US), Queen Elizabeth Hall | Southbank Centre (UK), Municipal Theatre of Piraeus (GR), Fonoteca Nacional de México (MX), Passerelle Centre d'art contemporain (FR), Berlin International Sound Art Festival (DE), Cyprus Theatre Organisation (CY), International Festival of Ancient Greek Drama (CY), 3LD Art & Technology Center (US), Irondale Center (US), The Invisible Dog Art Center (US), Point Centre for Contemporary Art (CY), the wulf. (US), The Royal Dockyard Church (UK), Metamatic: The Art Foundation (GR), The Ethnological Museum (CY), Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (US), Nicosia Municipal Arts Centre (CY) and is included in the Cyprus State Collection of Contemporary Art.
Much of his personal work investigates our experience of place through the use of field recordings as principal material. His particular interest in field recording relates to the contextual aspects of sound and the intersensory experience that it affords.
PHYSICAL PLASTIC is grateful to have the support of:
New Music USA
The Watermill Center
Foundation for Contemporary Arts
Theatro Polis OPAP & Pieredes Foundation
CalArts Alumni Council
Dancehouse Lefkosia
Echo Arts
Vert School of Dance
Creativity Dance Studio
As well as our friends: Joseph & Jacqueline Burley, Anthony Edwards, Doug Lacey, Jacqueline & Kevin Jorgeson, Yervant der Parthogh
We welcome inquiries and proposals from future patrons, and we gratefully accept tax-deductible donations through our fiscal sponsor, Fractured Atlas.
