Michelle Handelman, DOOMSCROLLING
MICHELLE HANDELMAN X SHANNON FUNCHESS
Sunday, October 17, at 8pm EST – October 24, 2021 on participantafterdark.art
Presented in collaboration with The Portland Institute for Contemporary Art (PICA)

Concept, videos, and live performance by: Michelle Handelman
Live performance: Shannon Funchess
Livestream video directed and edited by: Glen Fogel and Michelle Handelman
Live Audio & video engineers: Lazar Bozic (NYC) and Chris Balo (Portland)
Post-production sound mix: Quentin Chiappetta (Medianoise)
Animation: Enrique Maitland
ASL interpretation: Candace Davider

Including excerpts from:
Hustlers & Empires (2018/20)
Irma Vep, the Last Breath (2013/15)
Dorian, a Cinematic Perfume (2009/13)
Cinematography by: Ed David
Performers: Quin Charity, Zackary Drucker, Shannon Funchess, K8 Hardy, Armen Ra, Viva Ruiz, Flawless Sabrina, Sequinette
Composers: Vincent Baker, Quentin Chiappetta, John Kelly, Jonathan Kreinik, Carol Lipnik, Stefan Tcherepnin
Costumes: Neon Music, Garo Sparo, Karen Young, Zaldy
Hair/Makeup: Michael Gwaltney, Armen Ra, Naomi Raddatz, Sequinette

DOOMSCROLLING is part of Handelman’s THE PANDEMIC SERIES (2020-2021), which re-contextualizes characters from Handelman’s previous works into a hypnotic visual essay about the transfiguring of interiority during periods of isolation and fear. It takes as its starting point the current coronavirus pandemic and filters it through theorist Jill Casid’s writings on the necrocene, which Casid has described as living and dying on a dying planet; and Walter Benjamin’s writings on the difference between thresholds and boundaries. Handelman's characters, who each have already struggled with existential questions of belonging and fear in her projects DORIAN, A CINEMATIC PERFUME (2009/11), IRMA VEP, THE LAST BREATH (2013/15), and HUSTLERS & EMPIRES (2018) are juxtaposed with found images and texts sourced during the pandemic to take on a new form that both denies and struggles with containment.

Special thanks: Jill H. Casid, Frank Smigiel, John Morrow, Michael Rush, and Dominic Cloutie