Sex Workers Art Show National Tour on Stage at UNC Asheville;
February 26 Performance Combines Entertainment and Social Commentary
The Sex Workers Art Show, a national touring
company based in Olympia, Wash., will make a stop at UNC Asheville at 8
p.m. Sunday, Feb. 26, in UNC Asheville’s Lipinsky Auditorium.
The cabaret-style show, conceived as a form of cultural activism, is a
blend of burlesque, spoken word, music and multimedia performance art.
According to tour organizers, members of this show’s small cast are
former and current sex workers whose goals are both to entertain and to
dismantle the positive and negative stereotypes that define workers in
this multi-billion dollar international industry. The Sex Workers Art
Show cast members offer a look at their personal lives and provide
commentary on notions of class, labor, gender and sexuality.
Performers include filmmaker and performance artist Brigid Irish;
novelist Michelle Tea; artistic director of the black burlesque troupe
Harlem Shake Burlesque, Simone de al Getto; hip-hop poet Juba Kalamka;
burlesque dancer Julie Atlas Muz, who was a selected performance artist
for the Whitney Museum of American Art’s 2004 Biennial; writer Tralala
Farsi Sentiamo; prostitutes’ right movement founder Scarlet Harlot; and
tour founder Annie Oakley.
Other stops on the group’s spring tour of cities and campuses include
Ohio University, University of Hartford, University of Delaware, Rutgers
University, Swarthmore College, UC-Santa Barbara, UC-San Diego, and Reed
College.
The UNC Asheville performance is hosted by UNC Asheville student groups
Alliance and the Feminist Collective, and the departments of Drama,
Health and Wellness, Literature and Language, Political Science,
Sociology, Women’s Studies and the Arts and Ideas Program.
Please note that this performance contains sexual subject matter,
partial nudity and strong language. This performance is not appropriate
for young audiences. Funding for this performance was provided by the
UNC Asheville Foundation from interest earned on an unrestricted gift.
General admission is $5. To reserve tickets by phone, call UNC
Asheville’s Highsmith University Union Box Office at 828/232-5000
between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. weekdays.
Media Contact:
- Merianne Epstein, UNC Asheville Public Information
Director, 828/251-6676
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