Gesel Mason Performance Projects

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Bring Yes, And to St. Maarten and an Encore in Austin!

Austin, TX, US

$3,005 raised of $5,000 goal
36 donations
-944135 minutes left

Fiscally Sponsored by Fractured Atlas

"so many of us are moving, dancing and singing and wailing and poet-ing and marching and locking down and interrupting speeches and intervening in legal processes and educating and crawling and praying and flowing towards life; we are life moving towards life, and as June Jordan saw in us, we are the ones we’ve been waiting for.'” -- adrienne maree brown

Yes, And, a journey to remain whole

In the ongoing journey for justice and equity, it is vital to create spaces where we can thrive and be resourced. We have been invited to share (and receive!) the Yes, And experience in St. Maarten and to present an encore presentation at the Contemporary Austin in connection with Fusebox's 20th Anniversary.

Yes, And is catalyzed by the following questions:

Who would you be and what would you do if, as a Black woman, you had nothing to worry about? What would you create and how might you be in community with others?”

The result is a work that is both: YES, an unapologetic celebration of Black sisterhood, AND, a complex investigation of issues that impact Black women (cisgender, transgender, and gender non-conforming) and our communities.

Yes, And premiered in 2022 in Austin at Women & Their Work in Austin and Hillwood Estates Museum & Gardens in Washington, DC. For a peek into our creative process, check out our residency at Jacob’s Pillow (Inside the Pillow Lab: Gesel Mason).

We need your help to bring Yes, And to St. Maarten...

In February, Gesel and Mama Mason traveled to St. Maarten to understand how our questions resonate with Black women beyond the continental United States. Following her visit, Gesel was awarded a creative research grant from the College of Fine Arts at UT Austin to return to St. Maarten in May with the goal of exploring how the questions of Yes, And impact communities beyond the continental U.S. The grant only covers a portion of our expenses. This is where YOU come in.

We need to raise $5,000 to cover the expense of bringing FIVE members of Yes, And to St. Maarten. We will use the time to rest, build community, and lay the ground work for a future event in St. Maarten.

...and back to Austin!

Yes, And was invited to participate in Fusebox Festival's 20th Anniversary Celebration. Part of our time at St. Maarten will be used to prepare for an encore presentation of Yes, And at The Contemporary Austin on June 15, 2024. For this iteration of Yes, And, the performance will occupy all floors of the Jones Center, with Lubaina Himid’s work as a stage, the audience is invited to be immersed by both works, traveling up and culminating at the Rooftop followed by a reception. We hope you can join us!

The time is NOW!

Art is not a luxury, and neither is rest. Your support will help cover artist fees and travel expenses for Yes, And artists in St. Maarten and Austin, so we can do our work and worry less. Yes, And invites audiences and participants to inhabit inspired realities that reclaim the past, transform the present, and dream new futures into being. You can be a part of that future. All you have to do is say, YES!

"'Now is no ordinary moment in time. Now is a place of startling individual and collective endings. Now is the space before something else becomes. Now is both a promise and fulfillment of fresh beginnings.' – Pause, Rest, Be, Octavia F. Raheem