En Parábola/ Conversations on Tragedy (Part I)
2024
Multi-Channel Film | Theater
En Parábola/ Conversations on Tragedy (Part I)
2024
Multi-Channel Film | Theater
About THe Work
3-channel video installation with sound, parabolic shaped seating
4k video, 16mm film, 8mm film | 60 minutes
*for screener, write me at [email protected]
Part I was co-devised and co-authored in collaboration with:
Erica Ballester Nina Lucía Rodríguez Raquel Rodríguez Emma Suárez-Báez
Chorus by Xenia Rubinos
Exhibition gallery artworks developed in collaboration with Luis Vázquez O'neill and María "Lulú" Varona .
En Parábola/Conversations on Tragedy is a reassemblage of the Greek myth of Antigone in collaboration with a cast of non-professional actors who reside in Puerto Rico and in New York City’s Puerto Rican diasporic community. Developed through a multi-year process of collaborative theatrical rehearsal and experimental filmmaking, the work emerged through the cast’s revising, re-writing, and performing of the myth of Antigone inspired by their lived and inherited experiences of migration and belonging.Taking the form of a multi-channel film installation and a live performance series, En Parábola seeks to connect these communities after decades of geographical fragmentation, colonial erasure, dispossession, and cumulative environmental, economic, and political tragedies.
The first chapter of En Parábola is a multi-channel film that chronicles the New York City-based cast reimagining the myth of Antigone from their own perspectives. The film weaves together fictional and nonfictional narratives, layering documentation of the rehearsal process with behind-the-scenes footage and staged reenactments performed by the cast themselves.
Inspired by the original discourse of dramatic tragedy as a forum for communal catharsis, Parts I and II of En Parábola use theater and rehearsal as a platform through which to bring two casts together. Natalia and her collaborators deconstruct the Greek dramatic structure, using it as a creative device to explore the complexities of the Puerto Rican diasporic experience and the interconnected challenges faced by diverse migratory journeys. Together, they imagine a future for the play’s mythological characters wherein they survive the tragedy—a future that aligns with a Puerto Rican post-disaster imaginary in which new definitions of sovereignty and freedom are possible.
Through participatory efforts to reshape collective memory, En Parábola proposes theatrical rehearsal as a site of speculation and reunion, where Puerto Ricans can revise, unlearn, experiment, and build narratives, woven from their lived experiences. Re-envisioning sovereignty as an affective citizenship that exists beyond geographical boundaries, this project is fundamentally an invitation to exercise our right to imagination and the potentialities of fantasy and fiction.
The first chapter of En Parábola/Conversations on Tragedy was presented at Amant in Brooklyn from March 14th-June 23rd 2024 as part of Rituals of Speaking a film-led series exploring how artists represent the voices of others through collective storytelling. It was curated by Natalia Viera Salgado and comissioned by Amant with additional support from the Mellon Foundation and Princeton University. The second chapter of En Parábola chronicles the reimagining of Antigone from the perspectives of both the Puerto Rico-based and the New York-based cast, and culminates in a live theatrical performance that reunites both casts to adapt their scripts to the stage. Building on the multi-year process of collaboration carried out between both territories, Part II will be presented at Abrons Art Center in 2026.
Credits
- Director Natalia Lassalle-Morillo
- Co-Devised with Erica Ballester, Emma Suárez-Báez, Nina Lucía Rodríguez, Raquel Rodríguez
- Additional text and writing Elisa Peebles
- Chorus conducted by Xenia Rubinos
- Cinematography Natalia Lassalle-Morillo, Mollie Moore, and Laura Sofía Pérez
- Editing Natalia Lassalle-Morillo, Laura Sofía Pérez
- Producer Natalia Lassalle-Morillo, CAVAS Films, Xiaoyue Zhang
- Assistant Director Jorge Sánchez
- Sound Design and Mixing José Iván Lebrón Moreira
- Color Correcting Oswaldo Colón Ortíz
- Sound Operator Eduardo Calero, Maxime Robillard, Natalia Lassalle-Morillo
- Additional Camera Jenica Heintzelman, Carlos Ayala, Pablo Calderón Santiago, Xiaoyue Zhang
- 16 mm Developing & Digitization CineLab; Negativland
- Dramaturgy Amandla Colón, Elisa Peebles, Mireya Lucio
- Production Assistants Verónica Mojica, Sean Morillo, Amandla Colón, Mario Ruben Carrión, Laura Isabel Tropi
- Movement Advisor Sophia Treanor
- Performance Advisor Kairiana Nuñez Santaliz
- Design Luis Vázquez O'neill
- Chorus Erica Ballester, Carina del Valle Schorske, Melinda González, Micaela González, Víctor González, Zaida Adriana Goveo Balmaseda, Cristel Jusino, Liz Luyando, Sean Morillo, Camila Pérez, Kevin Emilio Pérez, Sofía Reeser del Río, G. Rosa Rey, José Antonio Rodríguez, Nina Lucia Rodríguez, Raquel Rodríguez, Rojo Robles, Estefanía Soto, Paulathena Stone, Emma Suárez-Báez, Nélida Tirado
- Puerto Rico-based Cast Angel Blanco, Francesca Carroll, Tashia Howard Arroyo, Marili Pizarro, Andrea Rovira, Janice Quevedo Santos, Víctor Torres