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THE PAINTED BIRD
Dedicated website for The Painted Bird Trilogy at www.thepaintedbird.org
Bastard (Part I) at La MaMa, November 2010
Amidst (Part II) at Baryshnikov Arts Center, June 23-25, 2011
Strange Cargo (Part III)

Pavel Zuštiak collaborates with American composer and musician Christian Frederickson while tackling the themes of displacement, otherness and transformation. Like in his previous works Zuštiak stays faithful to his signature style of creating sophisticated, multidisciplinary works with piercing emotional content and abundant surrealist imagery that explore "the darker shades of human behavior." (The New Yorker)

Bastard (Part I), the first part of a trilogy project The Painted Bird, is a live performance loosely inspired by the Jerzy Kosinski's controversial 1956 novel of the same title. In one of the chapters a wandering boy meets a bird trapper who, when upset, paints a bird brilliant colors and releases it. The bird's kin do not recognize the painted bird and attack the perceived interloper, violently killing it. That the shifting ground of migration, displacement and identity formation can be fatal looms ever larger at a personal level and in broader perspective.

Amidst (Part II), the middle part of the trilogy, which focuses on nostalgia as a place of entrapment on a journey "home.” The work is presented in a fluid theatrical structure, as audiences move freely amidst a sensory immersive installation at the intersection of dance performance and visual art. Haunting, ghostlike images by photographer Robert Flynt interface with the bodies of performers Lindsey Dietz Marchant, Nick Bruder, and Pavel Zuštiak, creating a juxtaposition of past and present, real and virtual, as constant shifting illusions. Amidst features original live music by Christian Frederickson, who is joined by musicians Jason Noble and Ryan Rumery. Amidst lighting designer is Joe Levasseur, set
designer is Nick Vaughan, with video by Keith Skretch, and dramaturgy by A.P. Andrews.