Dirt Stay-cation

“Dirt Stay-cation”
SPACE
Portland, ME | 2016

About the Show

Whoop Dee Doo teams up with the Boys & Girls Club, a doom metal band, an accordion ensemble and a girls choir, all inside a giant pile of dirt!

For two weeks, Whoop Dee Doo artists worked with eight incredible students from the Boys & Girls Club to brainstorm dirt-related ideas for a gargantuan mudslide of a set. Whoop Dee Doo also received assistance from several local artists and volunteers from the Portland area including amazing students from Maine College of Art. For ten days, we transformed a blank white space at SPACE gallery into a muddy, filthy, beautiful brown set chock-full of worms, potatoes, and moles.

Whoop Dee Doo researched the Portland, Maine community for several months in advance of their residency. After lots of digging for the perfect matches, we came up with some of the best performers we had ever worked with.

The show started off with a mashed potato-eating contest, where two audience members ate the “brains” of oversized potatoes played by Asmail and Abonga. Doom metal band Eastern Spell worked with the Boys and Girls Club kids to create a mole-themed performance and costumes. Accordion troupe Maine Squeeze popped out of a mud-hole to play beautiful old-time tunes. Lastly, with the Girls Choir Musica De Filia, we created all-white costumes for a performance to the famous gospel song “The Storm Is Passing Over”, where halfway through their song an indoor torrential downpour ensued, drenching them while they sang.

The installation and aftermath of our live show – confetti, popped balloons, filthy costumes and more – stayed installed at SPACE for over a month, with a projected video of the performances for audiences to view at two first Friday art walks in Portland.

Artists

Matt Roche
Jaimie Warren
Josh Pavlick
Erin Sheehy
Lindsey Griffith
Michael Boles
Calder Zwicky
Jeila Gueramian
Sarah Dahlinger
Gevan Wegener
Carver Rapp

Curation

Nat May


Youth Group

Boys & Girls Clubs of Southern Maine Riverton Park/ Sagamore Village


Performers

Eastern Spell
The Maine Squeeze Accordion Ensemble
Musica de Filia


Special Thanks

Kelly McConnell
Elise Pepple
Tiffanie Panagakos


Links

SPACE Gallery
SPACE Event page
Boys & Girls Club
Eastern Spell
Maine Squeeze
Musica de Filia
Maine College of Art