Intervention: Ocean Blues, Laura Barbata and the Brooklyn Jumbies from HMP on Vimeo.

Artist Laura Anderson Barbata‘s Intervention:Ocean Blues, in collaboration with the Brooklyn Jumbies, invites audiences to acknowledge our intersecting identities and to celebrate and honor them by changing behaviors to protect our oceans. 

Combining stilt dancing, procession, ritual, improvisation and audience interaction, Ocean Blues unfolds in an urban environment highly dependent on the health of the oceans, even though it may not be overtly obvious to our urban communities.

The performance is inspired by all the forms of life that make the ocean their home, in particular the extraordinary bioluminescent sea creatures that live in the least explored depths of our ocean and have the gift of creating their own light. Ocean Blues is a reminder that we must bring light to the crisis impacting our oceans, and draw attention to the urgent need to elevate and change the values and practices of private industry, policy and our own personal choices; to address responsibly sustainable development goals set by the United Nations (SDG14).

Intervention: Ocean Blues is produced by No Longer Empty and New York Rise for Climate, Jobs & Justice, in advance of: NYC Rise for Climate, Jobs & Justice march; Thursday, September 6, 5:30 pm; Battery Park

Also produced in solidarity with Mel Chin: Wake & Unmoored, and generously supported by The David Rockefeller Fund, Shelley & Donald Rubin Foundation, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo and the New York State Legislature.

Performers: Najja Codrington, Keil Alibocas, Khyle Lambert, Jabari Rollocks, Bonivia Bartolo, Cheikh Gueye, Jahde Huntley, Fatouseck Primus, Yuko Tsuji, Mei Yamanaka

Textile Sculptures team: Laura Anderson Barbata, Matthieu Goedefroot, Seancolin Hankins, Monica Mendoza Bravo, Karin Persan-Better Than Jam, Lorna Watts

Special thanks to: Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston