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Kathe Burkhart
ALMOST HEAVEN
Nov 15 – Dec 31, 2023

Kathe Burkhart, Almost Heaven
November 15 – December 31, 2023
on participantafterdark.art

PARTICIPANT AFTER DARK presents an online video premiere of a durational literary performance featuring Kathe Burkhart reading her new book, Almost Heaven, in its entirety. Presented in conjunction with exhibitions of Burkhart’s work at New York University's Fales Library and Special Collections and at Cheim & Read.

Almost Heaven is a collection of twenty interrelated stories full of Southern discomfort mostly set in 1970s West Virginia, a place that is plagued by the dark side of the American dream: transgenerational trauma and poverty, the ghosts of the Civil War, and a drug subculture that preceded the current Opioid Crisis but had no name yet. 

Almost Heaven, written and read by Kathe Burkhart
total running time 4 hours, 42 minutes

Technical Director and Video Editor: Itziar Barrio
Cameras: Marit Liang, Itziar Barrio

Lighting Design: Marit Liang

Audio Recording and Audio Mix: Sophia Orlow
Subtitles: Sarah Anderson, Itziar Barrio

Kathe Burkhart is an interdisciplinary artist and writer. A graduate of CalArts (BFA 1982, MFA 1984) working since the early ‘80s, Burkhart has consistently and candidly engaged gender roles, sexuality, celebrity, and language to, in her words, “articulate a radical female subject.” Burkhart has had 45 solo exhibitions including Rozenstraat a rose is a rose is a rose, Netherlands; Fri Art, Fribourg, Switzerland; MoMA PS1, New York; and Participant Inc., New York; among other venues. Burkhart participated in the 45th Venice Biennale (1993),and was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2017 a Pollock Krasner Fellowship in 2021 and a Mondriaan Foundation grant in 2023. She maintains an interdisciplinary practice, and has published four books of fiction, two in French translation, in addition to a vast collection of poetry and essays. 

PARTICIPANT AFTER DARK is a virtual performance, screening, and project space launched by PARTICIPANT INC in October 2020. The site hosts artist projects commissioned specifically for the AFTER DARK web platform and remote viewing. PARTICIPANT invited artist Glen Fogel to design and develop AFTER DARK’s inaugural 2020-21 seasons, with Itziar Barrio joining this role in 2022, working in collaboration with Caroline Mills, to produce web and video projects that enable artists to inhabit the site and modify it for their projects' specific needs. 

This project is supported, in part, by Mondriaan Fund for Visual Arts and Cultural Heritage, the Netherlands.

More from Season 22

Patrice Aphrodite Helmar
PATRICE APHRODITE HELMAR, POLARIS
June 30 - August 18, 2024
Silvester Hustito a.k.a. Sobé, John Singer Sargent with We’wha Portait, 2018, digital artwork
Silvester Hustito a.k.a. Sobé
WHY AM I ALIVE NOW?
extended through June 23, 2024
Drawing based on 40,000 year old red ochre hand stencil at El Castillo cave complex, Puente Viesgo, Spain.
Cecilia Dougherty
SHANIDAR, SAFE RETURN
extended through July 14
**Itziar Barrio,** *SKIRA* monograph cover with still from ROBOTA MML, 2023, 4K Video. 
Itziar Barrio
BOOK LAUNCH
Sunday, April 28, 5-7pm
**Ellen Cantor,** *Remember Me,* 1998, 10:25 min, b&w and color, sound, courtesy Estate of Ellen Cantor and Electronic Arts Intermix. 
Ellen Cantor
JOY OF LOVE
Feb 25 – April 7, 2024
**Flowers in the Basement,** *Women and Children*, 2024
Flowers in the Basement
WOMEN AND CHILDREN
Jan 21 – Feb 4, 2024
Kathe Burkhart
ALMOST HEAVEN
Nov 15 – Dec 31, 2023
Jewish Voice for Peace, “1991: Money for healthcare, not warfare, 2023: Same,” Instagram post, October 2023, Grand Central Station
RESOURCES IN SUPPORT OF PALESTINE
Amy Ruhl, Between Tin Men #3, 2023, video still 
Amy Ruhl
BETWEEN TIN MEN
September 10 – November 5, 2023

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