About This Show
*WHAT?* A mutation of the traditional Middle Eastern Karagoz shadow puppet play (famous in Turkey, Greece, Egypt, and Syria) about the consequences of being on the fringes of society…EVERY society. It’s a comedy!
*HUNH?* Zaloom tells the twisted story of an Arab, secular humanist / Quaker / Buddhist / agnostic / political refugee / immigrant / queer / artist / weirdo’s adventures while being comically pursued by various
enemies: Syrian Secret Service, Israeli border guards, Al Qaeda, Homeland Security, the Statue of Liberty, Christian “Ex Gay”
activists, and U.S. immigration vigilantes the Minutemen. The idiot savant Karagoz foils their evil plans, dispatching them one by one with subterfuge, obfuscation, and cheap puppet gimmicks. They all fail; he triumphs. Zaloom jiggles his puppets, recounts absurd emails with Marine recruiters, creates the entire soundscape with his voice, and uses drawings to illuminate the perverse workings of our “civilization” with a frontal comic assault. **
WHY? *This performance is presented in conjunction with the exhibition /Neo-Sincerity: The Difference Between the Comic and the Cosmic is a Single Letter/
apexart curated by Amei Wallach, on view Feb 22 – April 8, 2006 at apexart, a 501(c)(3) non-profit contemporary visual arts organization at 291 Church Street in Tribeca (one block north of Collective:Unconscious). Gallery hours are Tues-Sat 11-6, and will be extended to 7:30 pm Thurs/Fri/Sat to accommodate visitors during show dates listed above. Closed Sunday.
This performance received generous support from the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council through The September 11th Fund.