Here are the local performers in Scapegoat Garden’s Liturgy|Order|Bridge, making its Maine premiere June 20-22nd! The dance performance/ritual calls upon Black church traditions and secular performance modalities, pushing and pulling ideas of faith, nature, fashion, and experimentation.
Our June performances of Creative Capital Awardee Deborah Goffe’s Liturgy|Order|Bridge will feature a “Threshold Chorus” and a group of “Wisdom Keepers” made up of Portland area community members, artists, and culture bearers, including performers Alexandra (Allie) James, Veeva Banga, Eliora Benerugaba, Candice Gosta, and Saniya Ridley, and with Athena Lynch writing the program’s litany.
Presented by SPACE in collaboration with Mechanics’ Hall, with production support from @indigoartsalliance and @mainehumanities and funding from @nefa_arts and the Moser Family Foundation.
June 20-22 | Thu-Fri 7 pm, doors at 6:30; Sat 2 pm, doors at 1:30
@scapegoatgarden – Liturgy|Order|Bridge
at Mechanics’ Hall, 519 Congress Street, Portland
$30 adv, $35 day of | $2 off for @space538 AND @maine.mechanics members
Co-presented by SPACE and Mechanics’ Hall
We can’t wait to welcome The Halluci Nation for another exhilarating night. Join us for as the movement-building Canadian indigenous electronic duo brings the genre-defying sounds of their “Electric Pow Wow” back to SPACE. They sold out last November, so don’t sleep on grabbing tickets 👀 in the bio
Formerly known as A Tribe Called Red, the group’s most recent EP, last November’s Path of the Heel, sees the group expanding to wild terrain, pairing with vocalist Damian Abraham (F**ked Up, the Turned Out a Punk podcast) and Alberta, Canada’s Northern Cree, one of the best acts in modern North American powwow music.
June 5 | Wed 8 pm, doors at 7
The Halluci Nation with Firefly
$20 adv, $25 day of show
$2 off for SPACE members
And here’s Okkervil River covering The Antlers’ “Green to Gold,” a second sneaky peek at this Thursday’s show between both indie-folk artists playing old songs, new songs, each other’s songs. That’s coming right up on May 30th — tickets are available now and we are in 🚨LOW-TICKET ALERT🚨 territory
“Green to Gold” is a song that The Antlers’ Peter Silberman wrote after a hiatus. The band’s pace, its emotional core, had reportedly become unsustainable. Exhausted, physically spent and wracked with tinnitus, Silberman put the band down and took up gardening and meditation. With 2021’s Green to Gold, he set out to make “Sunday morning music,” with nods to late-era Talk Talk.
Called “one of indie-rock’s most ambitious thinkers,” Will Sheff of Okkervil River has ascended to become one of the country’s finest and hardest-working songwriters, even making Barack Obama’s summer vacation playlist in 2015. He gives the Antlers’ track a little bit of yearning edge, and those kinds of Sunday mornings are out there too.
Join us Thursday as these two indie giants have fun with their work. They’re going to be making songs for a long time, and this crossroads will be a special one.
May 30 | Thu 8 pm, doors at 7
The Antlers (@theantlers) & Okkervil River (@okkervilriver)
$27 adv, $32 day of show
$2 off for SPACE members
We’re showing that BDSM movie everyone’s clacking about! On June 6th, see Joanna Arnow’s brilliantly sardonic hit indie film The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed, a distinctive and wryly funny exploration of millennial estrangement and kinky sex. 🎟️ available in bio.
The film follows a 30-something New York woman (Arnow) as time passes in her long-term casual BDSM relationship, low-level corporate job, and quarrelsome Jewish family.
Richard Brody of The New Yorker called it a “deceptively plain masterpiece,” adding that “Arnow’s poignant and original performance — refined in its awkwardness, exalted in its degradation, touched with grace in its rude self-presentation — is a double masterwork of acting and directing.”
TFTTTFDSHP world-premiered in Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight and is executive produced by Sean Baker.
June 6 | Thu 7 pm, doors at 6:30
The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed 🎥
dir. Joanna Arnow | 87 min.
$10, $7 for SPACE members
We’re showing that BDSM movie everyone’s clacking about! On June 6th, see Joanna Arnow’s brilliantly sardonic hit indie film The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed, a distinctive and wryly funny exploration of millennial estrangement and kinky sex. 🎟️ available in bio.
The film follows a 30-something New York woman (Arnow) as time passes in her long-term casual BDSM relationship, low-level corporate job, and quarrelsome Jewish family.
Richard Brody of The New Yorker called it a “deceptively plain masterpiece,” adding that “Arnow’s poignant and original performance — refined in its awkwardness, exalted in its degradation, touched with grace in its rude self-presentation — is a double masterwork of acting and directing.”
TFTTTFDSHP world-premiered in Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight and is executive produced by Sean Baker.
June 6 | Thu 7 pm, doors at 6:30
The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed 🎥
dir. Joanna Arnow | 87 min.
$10, $7 for SPACE members
A lil snippet of The Antlers & Okkervil River affair coming up next Thursday, an intimate affair with both artists playing old songs, new songs, each other’s songs. That’s one week away! 🎟️ in bio — and yes we are in 🚨LOW-TICKET ALERT🚨 territory
Here’s The Antlers’ Peter Silberman covering Okkervil River’s “A Glow” from the latter’s breakthrough 2005 album Black Sheep Boy. The Antlers bucolic new stuff was described by Pitchfork as a “post-rock orchestra playing around a campfire…the sound of hard-won peace of mind, rendered in the lightest brush strokes.”
May 30 | Thu 8 pm, doors at 7
The Antlers (@theantlers) & Okkervil River (@okkervilriver)
$27 adv, $32 day of show
$2 off for SPACE members
We’re excited to team up with Bates Film Festival as a venue partner. This Friday May 17th through Sunday, the student-run and thoughtfully curated Bates Film Festival screens seven terrific films at SPACE…for free! With plenty of special guests.
See batesfilmfestival.com for more info. The SPACE schedule is below.
Fallen Leaves
dir. Aki Kaurismäki
2023 | 81 min.
12:00 pm
Family Portrait Sittings
dir. Alfred Guzzetti
1975 | 103 min.
with Q&A with director Alfred Guzzetti
3:00 pm
We Are the Warriors
dir. David Camlin & Megan Grumbling
2023 | 72 min.
with Q&A with directors David Camlin and Megan Grumbling
7:00 pm
Four Daughters
dir. Kaouther Ben Hania
2023 | 107 min.
11 am
Breaking the News
dir. Heather Courtney, Princess A. Hairston, and Chelsea Hernandez
2023 | 99 min.
2 pm
The Eternal Memory
dir. Maite Alberdi
2023 | 85 min.
11:00 am
Amigo
dir. John Sayles
2010 | 125 min.
with Q&A with director John Sayles
1:00 pm
Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence
dir. Nagisa Oshima
1983 | 123 min.
with Q&A with Kate Hideki, composter/musician; Hiroya Miura, composer/Associate Professor of Music at Bates College and Gina Fatone, Associate Professor of Music at Bates College
4:30 pm
🖤 RIP Steve Albini
Shellac at SPACE, October 20, 2016
via youtube.com/@narlus
On May 24, join us for Queer Futures, a four-part omnibus executively produced by Jenna Wortham.
The QUEER FUTURES collection of films centers joy and connection to radically imagine future visions of queer life. Four short films explore fat beauty and liberation, gender affirming healthcare, nonbinary ballroom culture, and the anonymous connections of a decades-old LGBTQ hotline.
Transcending the rigidity and oppressions of the current moment, these films build speculative worlds that offer new ways of being – in the present and the future. Just as queer lives subvert normative expectations of behavior, identity, and expression, these directors expand the boundaries of nonfiction forms to present new ways of seeing the queer experience lived out loud.
4 SHORT FILMS
• How to Carry Water (dir. Sasha Wortzel)
• The Script (dir. Brit Fryer & Noah Schamus)
• MnM (dir. Twiggy Pucci Garçon)
• The Callers (dir. Lindsey Dryden)
May 24 | Fri 7 pm, doors at 6:30
Queer Futures 🎥
$10, $7 for SPACE members
Sunday night at SPACE! SLAM sparked a movement, spreading spoken word poetry around the world. See the newly restored 25th anniversary version of the 1998 classic, written by Saul Williams and Sonja Sohn and directed by Marc Levin, Sunday at 7 pm.
April 28 | Sun 7 pm, doors at 6:30
Slam 🎥
dir. Marc Levin | 100 min.
$10, $7 for members
Winner of the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance and Best First Feature at Caméra d’Or, 𝘚𝘭𝘢𝘮 is “poetry in vibrant motion,” wrote the San Francisco Chronicle, with “powerful performances from genuine talents.” We’re proud to screen this newly restored 25th anniversary version of Saul Williams and Marc Levin’s classic 1998 film. Join us next Sunday, April 28th - tickets in bio.
“Much the same way that Saturday Night Fever created a boom by conferring a machine glamour on disco, Marc Levin’s stirring pop fable 𝘚𝘭𝘢𝘮 elevates rhythmically charged, fervently incantatory street poetry into a redemptive sport.” - 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘕𝘦𝘸 𝘠𝘰𝘳𝘬 𝘛𝘪𝘮𝘦𝘴
April 28 | 7 pm, doors at 6:30
Slam 🎥
Directed by Marc Levin | 1998 | 100 min.
$10, $7 for SPACE members
𝘙𝘺𝘶𝘪𝘤𝘩𝘪 𝘚𝘢𝘬𝘢𝘮𝘰𝘵𝘰 | 𝘖𝘱𝘶𝘴 is “a uniquely affecting last will and testament” and a definitive swan song of one of the world’s greatest musicians. Featuring just him and his piano, the 20 pieces span his entire five-decade career, from his pop star period with Yellow Magic Orchestra and his magnificent scores for filmmaker Bernardo Bertolucci to his meditative final album, 12.
We’re screening this special concert film — directed by Sakamoto’s son, the filmmaker Neo Sora — this Friday, April 26th, at 7 pm. Join us and be transported to this composer’s singular emotional terrain.
April 26 | Fri 7 pm, doors at 6:30
𝘙𝘺𝘶𝘪𝘤𝘩𝘪 𝘚𝘢𝘬𝘢𝘮𝘰𝘵𝘰 | 𝘖𝘱𝘶𝘴
Directed by Neo Sora | 103 min.
$10, $7 for SPACE members
The People’s Joker is “here, queer, and the only viable path forward for superhero movies,” writes Rolling Stone in a glowing review of Vera Drew’s “hilarious, relentlessly inventive, and profoundly moving” take on the Batman villain’s mythology.
We’ve got only a couple dozen seats left for our screening on Saturday, April 20th. Grab yours now via the link 🔝
You know Drew’s work from iconic comedy TV, via Tim and Eric’s Abso Lutely Productions and shows like Comedy Bang! Bang!, Check It Out with Dr. Steve Brule, I Think Ypu Should Leave, and Tim and Eric’s streaming tv network. Before that, she worked on Highland Park TV and Everything is Terrible.
April 20 | Sat 7 pm, doors at 6:30
The People’s Joker 🎥
Directed by Vera Drew | 91 min.
$10, $7 for SPACE members
Sunday Tripleheader at SPACE! Starting with two productions of The Rainbow Beard Show at 11 am and 2 pm. Kids tickets are FREE for this Providence-based variety show aimed at kids 8 & under, with stories, puppets, games and more.
Then, join us for the Ethiopian supergroup Qwanqwa at 8 pm! The psychedelic roots group uses traditional Ethiopiques sounds with experimental pop for an ecstatic, highly danceable sound.
The first screening of the Indigo Girls doc sold out quick — you’re not about to let the encore screening go, are you?
Blending 40 years of home movies, raw film archive, and intimate present-day verité, a poignant reflection from Amy Ray and Emily Saliers is a timely look into the obstacles, activism, and life lessons of two queer friends who never expected to make it big.
April 10 | Wed 7 pm, doors at 6:30 | SOLD OUT
April 13 | Sat 7 pm, doors at 6:30 | 🚨 LOW TICKET ALERT 🚨
Lost Angel: The Genius of Judee Sill is “one of the most advanced and important rock documentaries we have gotten yet” (Film Threat). Join us next Friday, April 12th, on the date of its theatrical premiere.
The never-before-seem story of 1970s folk-rock icon Judee Sill charts her meteoric rise in the music world and early tragic death. With interviews with Adrianne Lenker and Buck Meek of Big Thief, Shawn Colvin, Jackson Browne, Graham Nash, Linda Ronstadt, Natalie Mering of Weyes Blood, David Crosby and much more, the film “is the kind of film that buries in your ribcage and keeps glowing for days afterward.” (Film Threat)
April 12 | Friday 7 pm, doors at 6:30
Lost Angel: The Genius of Judee Sill
Directed by Brian Lindstrom and Andy Brown
91 min.
$10, $7 for SPACE members
Qwanqwa “takes traditional music and rocks it up a bit” (Byron Coley, The Wire) and “for sure is an incredible experimental traditional Ethiopian rock group that deserves to be played in every living room, at every party and on every radio station from Gondar to Santa Cruz.” (Addis Rumble blog).
If you’ve heard the golden age of Ethiopian pop as immortalized by the Ethiopiques series and wondered why no one was rocking like that lately, you can stop wondering. They’re doing it. Qwanqwa bridges generations and continents, making a huge sound that you can only hear if you’re here, right now.
Here’s a punchy little scene from the last time Qwanqwa played SPACE — a blast. We’re thrilled to bring the joyous, high energy, very danceable psychedelic roots supergroup from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, back to Portland next Sunday, April 7th. Tickets in bio.
April 7 | Sun 8 pm, doors at 7:30
@qwanqwaband
$15 adv, $20 day of
$2 off for SPACE members
Regrammed IG story originally by @ekhlas.ahmed
Wed, April 3 🎥 — The lines of seduction, revenge and power are blurred in 𝘍𝘦𝘮𝘮𝘦, a tense and stylish thriller about desire and self-loathing, starring Nathan Stewart-Jarrett and George MacKay. Ticket link in bio.
“This queer thriller avoids predictability and masterfully explores masculinity, ethics, and identity.” - Chicago Reader
“𝘍𝘦𝘮𝘮𝘦 is a really well-worked-through story with tense developments and reversals; it keeps you on the edge of your seat and the outstanding performances from Stewart-Jarrett and MacKay have delicacy, subtlety and depth. - The Guardian
“Murky morality abounds in the exhilarating 𝘍𝘦𝘮𝘮𝘦. It’s a credit to the filmmakers that this cat-and-mouse game takes such intriguing turns.” - Time Out
April 3 | Wed 7 pm, doors at 6:30
𝘍𝘦𝘮𝘮𝘦
Directed by Sam H. Freeman and Ng Choon Ping
99 min.
$10, $7 for SPACE members
Portland-based artist Gelsey Amelia / @snowislikeawidesea just finished installation of a stunning new mural in one of our bathrooms, and we are over the 🌖 about it.
Enjoy ‘A Prayer’ up indefinitely, commissioned by SPACE.
A PRAYER–
for liberation & abundance of all living things
abandon the myth of scarcity
gratitude for fruits & soil, air & water, plants & animals envision an end to empire & colonial occupation
freedom for all oppressed beings on this earth
free palestine, free them all
Gelsey Amelia (she/they) is a queer multidisciplinary artist whose work uses performance, illustration, plants, ritual & Installation to explore themes of transmutation, gay eroticism, nature, ancestry, mythology, & utopian/dystopian visions. Her work often includes celebration and sharing meals in spaces she intentionally creates to foster healing and solace.
gelseyamelia.com
@snowislikeawidesea
