WHAT
THE LUCKIEST ARAB IN BELFAST IS A SERIES OF AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL MONOLOGUES THAT I WROTE AND PERFORMED IN A SITE SPECIFIC INSTALLATION, WHICH BECAME A SOLO ART EXHIBITION OF MY COLLAGE AND SCULPTURE.
WHO
Mac Premo , b. 1973: American artist, stuffmaker, commercial director, NYFA fellow. Mac graduated from RISD in 1995. He has exhibited in NY, LA, DC, Miami, London and PS1 MOMA in Queens, and has participated in several public art projects in Belfast, Northern Ireland. His fine art is represented by Pavel Zoubok Gallery in New York. Mac has won 7 New York Emmy® Awards for his video and animation work, including awards for best commercial, best photography, and best set design. He currently makes art, video, illustration, wooden things, noises and dinner (most nights). Mac lives in Brooklyn with his wife and two totally radical daughters. The Luckiest Arab in Belfast is Mac’s first solo performance.
WHY
WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE. And soon. But hey, in the meantime we invest time, effort and love into things like baseball, steak, our families. That’s a paradox. That’s weird. I can’t figure that out...
SO I WROTE A PLAY
I guess it’s a play. I’m not really sure. This is what happened: last year I made all this art, presented it in a gallery setting, and came away with a feeling that there was no direct connection, no apparent or mutual relationship between the observer and the observed. So I figured the best way to communicate was to literally just do that: stand up in front of real humans and tell stories. I wrote every story from my life that I could remember. Then I edited. A lot.
WHERE
The Luckiest Arab in Belfast was first performed at the Invisible Dog Art Center in Brooklyn, New York. The set was inspired by the content of the play and featured 134 of my collage sculptures, a mini-half pipe, a desk with a lot of crap on it, a map, a saw and like a million wood scraps. After the run of the performance, the set was transformed into a solo exhibition of my artwork. The Luckiest Arab in Belfast was also performed in the hull of a modified barge on the River Lagan in Belfast, Northern Ireland as part of the Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival.
WHAT NEXT
I am not an actor. I am not a playwright. I am a collage artist. In many ways this work is an examination of the reasoning behind my collage / sculpture through stories. The Luckiest Arab in Belfast is an extension of my practice. That it's a performance is a question of medium, not vocation. My goal is to present The Luckiest Arab in Belfast in the fine art and performance setting as opposed to the traditional theater setting. I’m currently seeking institutions and programs that seem like a mutual good fit.
