Tend is free to the public. It is a museum installation. It is a dance performance. It is a salon experience. It is a social experiment. It is the easy intimacy of small talk. It is the deep nurturing of a shoulder massage from a friend. It is a crafted environment of fabric, wood, space, and mirrors.

This genre-bending work will be presented by The City of Chicago at The Chicago Cultural Center for two months this summer.

“As I left “Tend,” I felt light, like walking on air. The memory of the dancing, performed in such a small space, was tight and technical, but also spontaneous and organic.”

-See Chicago Dance

Tend is a service-based performance experience fulfilling a socially requisite and biologically exigent allogrooming need. Structured as a one hour appointment, the self-care informed dance and music score leaves space for you to allow your nervous system to settle, contemplate the inherent power differentials in human interaction, and allow the somatic possibility of conflict resolution in true social grooming form. The world of Tend exists in the motile architecture of a reflective, airy, enveloping, and luminescent convalescence banquette that the performance appointments flow through continuously through the day. Colliding necessity, extravagance, and irrelevance, it imagines a world where your monthly dance appointment is a legitimate need, a necessary line item in your personal budget. A haptic, phatic, and kinetic service providing a much-needed place to rest, recharge, reflect, reconcile. An environment supporting small talk, catching up, grooming bodies and relationships in turn.

In short, come ready to chat, be touched/touch, and watch a performance made especially for you.

To view the live performance version of Tend, audience members select an hour long appointment time. Thursday and Saturday appointments are available every half hour between 12:30pm – 4pm. To view the Tend video, photo, and constructed environment installation, visit the Yates Gallery during open hours of the Chicago Cultural Center.

To attend this performance, please visit https://www.khecari.org/tend/
You will be asked to fill out a brief audience interest form. This is not a vetting process but to ensure clear, informed consent.
Ticketing information will be provided upon completion of the form.

Tickets + Details:

Khecari presents Tend by Julia Rae Antonick

June 15th, 2024 - July 18th, 2024
Performances are June 15, 20, 22, 27, 29, and July 6, 8, 11, 13, 18 Gallery hours for installation viewing are 10am-5pm every day

Yates Gallery of the Chicago Cultural Center

Free https://www.khecari.org/tend/

Khecari supports the artistic inquiry of choreographers Julia Rae Antonick and Jonathan Meyer and presents the work they create in collaboration with artists in dance, music, design, and other media, to offer live performed art that challenges, engages, and focuses. Art is vital. We engage art as a fluid, undefined, questioning and questing force in society. The body is vital. Live performance connects us to our lived, physically grounded reality. Khecari presents unusual, intimate experiences that attend to the audience, challenge theatrical conventions and disrupt social norms. We hold a radical care philosophy that places the audience at the core of our work. We prioritize equal compensation to all collaborators, in part to address the endemic underpay of dancers, and to advocate for the essential role of art within society, of dance within the arts, and of all artists working within the dance ecosystem.

Artists who are currently working on Tend: Julia Rae Antonick – choreographer/director

Gina Hoch-Stall – project discussion/main cast performer/care contact Chih-Hsien Lin – project discussion/main cast performer
Enid Smith – project discussion/main cast performer
Helen Lee – project discussion/main cast performer

Kristina Diaz – project discussion/main cast performer
Maggie Vannucci – project discussion/main cast performer
Jonathan Meyer – environmental construction/design/lighting/project discussion Joe St.Charles – composer/project discussion
Jeff Hancock – environmental construction/costuming/project discussion
Heather LaHood – architect/project discussion/environmental construction/design Kristin Weinberg – photography

Artists who have contributed to Tend:
Phillip Wood – project development cast/project discussion
Jordan Reinwald – project development cast/project discussion
Kellyn Jackson – project development cast/project discussion
Jenn Freeman – project discussion/graphic development/project development cast JmeJames – project discussion/project development cast
Precious Jennings – childcare
Jamila Kekula Kinney – project training/discussion
Jyreika Guest – project training/discussion
Francine Kelley – project training/discussion
Suzi Coates – project training/discussion
Jenny Oelerich – project discussion/project development cast
Charlie Vail – project discussion/project development cast
Maddy Joss – project discussion/project development cast
Amanda Maraist – project idea exploration
Ian Vecchiotti – photography/videography

Image: photo by Kristin Weinberg, pictured (left to right) are Enid Smith, Julia Rae Antonick, Helen Lee, and Gina Hoch-Stall