Invisible Cities by Processional Arts

Help design and build a participatory performance in collaborative multi-generational workshops

Workshops July 15–28 take part in any or all workshops, register below
Final performance July 29

Rain date: July 30

Processional Arts Workshop brings Invisible Cities to life in two weeks of fun, exploratory community workshops. Participants are invited to collaborate in creating and performing their own imagined cities as pageant puppets and performing objects, transforming PS21’s pathways into a shifting landscape of animated architectural follies. Guided by poetic fragments, found sounds, and unreliable maps, visitors encounter cities at random, trying to make sense of a once-familiar world that seems to fade, with each step, into an elusive, half-remembered dream.

Presented during PATHWAYS DAY, Invisible Cities is a roving performance installation inspired by Italo Calvino’s kaleidoscopic allegory of how we inhabit, negotiate, and remember shared spaces. Revealed in Marco Polo’s reports to Kublai Khan of his sprawling, ungraspable empire, Calvino’s cities seem fantastical yet familiar, as we struggle, like the Emperor, to comprehend the reality of a vast human enterprise.

Workshop participants are invited to come to as many or as few sessions as they like, all of which are free, and take part in the final performance. While workshops are geared towards adults and teens, kids ages 8 and up are welcome to work with an adult. No experience necessary, one will be provided!

Part of PS21 PATHWAYS Day 2023 / Italo Calvino Centennial