About this performance

Revival

Revival is an immersive ritualistic theater and installation work by the well-known Seattle-based Indigenous artist Timothy White Eagle and his team of collaborators, The Violet Triangle–Paul Budraitis, HATLO, and John Kendall Wilson. This new theater work is rooted in ritual theater and explores one of the oldest and most universal myths, the story of a hero being swallowed alive and then returned, which has appeared around the world. The artists use this ancient story to ponder what it means to be living in our contemporary moment through isolation and longing for community. Timothy is well-known for artworks and live experiences that juxtapose the profane with the sacred.

Audiences will experience a visit to a carnival, where attendees play games in a loud, chaotic, and vibrant setting. Next the audience will be taken on a journey through space and time guided in the building of On the Boards on to the Merrill theater stage where audiences will be swallowed in the belly of the whale, La Baleine. This treasure filled journey will be marked by reliquaries staged throughout the space, each combining storytelling and universal mythology into fantastic sculptural elements. This new performance and installation work are by nature process-based, iterative, and generative. TWE and their collaborators use their COVID-era research as a series of development experiments both online and live to adapt Revival to each specific time and place it is performed.

Developed with generous support from John Robinson, 4Culture, and Seattle City Artist grant.