Alison S.M. Kobayashi with Christopher Allen

Additional Information

Dunlop Art Gallery welcomes Brooklyn, NY-based artist Alison S. M. Kobayashi and collaborator Christopher Allen to present a new performance, Thinking as She Thinks. Found objects that Kobayashi has collected over the last decade (audio recordings, diaries, sprawling lists, and other ephemera) comprise the narrative content of this one-woman performance that merges consumer technology with an array of dark, funny, and strange characters. Taking these documents from unknown authors as a starting point, the artist reanimates details found in the source material, then proceeds to fictionalize the rest of the story. As one vignette morphs inventively into the next, the audience experiences shifts in time and space, gender, age, class and race.

The evening will also feature Armando-format improv. Kobayashi will provide a monologue that will serve as inspiration for a series of unscripted scenes by the Tragedy Plus Time Players–Jayden Pfiefer, Katie Moore, Colby Richardson, and Judy Wensel.

Alison S. M. Kobayashi was born in Mississauga, Canada where she received a BA from the University of Toronto. She now works in Brooklyn where she is the Director of Special Projects at UnionDocs: Center for documentary art. Kobayashi’s short videos have been exhibited and screened widely in Canada, the United States and overseas, garnering numerous awards. In 2012, she was commissioned by Les Subsistances in Lyon, France to produce her first live performance, Defense Mechanism. She is currently developing her second live performance.

After graduating from Columbia University and studying at Trinity College Dublin, Christopher Allen worked as a social entrepreneur, documentary director, and new media artist. His individual works and collaborative projects have been exhibited internationally. Allen was founding-partner of Counts Media and is the founder and Executive Artistic Director of UnionDocs, a center for documentary art in Brooklyn, NY.

Alison S.M. Kobayashi with Christopher Allen, DEFENSE MECHANISM ou MÉCHANISME DE DÉFENSE, 2012, performance Photo: Romain Etienne.