Performance Art Group Pageant Completes Residency at MoMA

On 26 August, the artist-run performance space Pageant, based in Brooklyn, concluded a month-long residency at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York. The residency featured a seven-hour performance marathon, titled 'Pageant Presents Pageant,' which included 25 ten-minute performances.

The marathon began with a piece by choreographer, director, and writer Isa Spector. Spector's performance involved a struggle to create a 'painting of dance' within a ten-minute timeframe, culminating in a living parody of Henri Matisse's 'Dance (I)' (1909), enacted by five performers wearing red gloves. The performers were Sharleen Chidiac, Lili Dekker, Jade Manns, Owen Prum, and Alexa West, who are the co-founders of Pageant.

Throughout the marathon, various performances explored the relationship between dance and its historical and visual art counterparts. The residency marked Pageant's first major institutional collaboration since its establishment in 2022 in a third-story loft on Graham Avenue in East Williamsburg. The space was preceded by a different venue run by Manns and Chidiac out of their apartment.

The residency was part of a broader trend of performance art gaining traction in contemporary art spaces. Pageant's co-founders highlighted the evolution of dance from a pictorial form in modernism to more abstract expressions in postmodernism.

**Context:** The residency underscores the growing interest in performance art and its integration into traditional art institutions. It also highlights the evolving relationship between dance and visual art, reflecting broader trends in contemporary art.