"You can’t create a show called 'The Geek Show 2: BindleCon' without some serious nerd cred." - Lily Janiak, Theater Critic, SF Chronicle

 

"I love Bindlestiff...they consistently put on incredible work that is completely diverse that embraces contemporary issues... let's talk about POC geeks, y'all!"  - Beatrice Thomas (aka Black Benatar) KALW's Sights & Sounds

 

Don't miss the show everyone is raving about! The Geek Show 2: BindleCon has been featured in the San Francisco Chronicle and on KALW's Sights & Sounds. With only six shows left, April 19-28, Thursday-Saturday, 8pm, you'd better get your tickets now!

 

We have special discounted tickets for this Friday, April 20! Enter promo code: FRIDAY and receive $15 General Tickets, valid only for this Friday's show!

 

The Geek Show 2: BindleCon

April 19-28

Thurs - Sat, 8pm

$15 Student/Senior

$20 General

$25 Support-the-Artists

https://geekshow2.bpt.me

 

 

Kularts’ Isugid Pinoy! exhibition (ee-soo-ghid), meaning tell it Pilipino in the Philippine Bisayan language, explores the diverse stories of five anchor organizations of the state and city-wide recognized SOMA Pilipinas – Filipino Cultural Heritage District and reimagines them as graphic storytelling, comic collaborative artworks exhibited at Bindlestiff Studio, concurrently during the run of The Geek Show 2: Bindlecon.

 

From the characters traits, costumes, to their heroic storylines, illustrators Don Aguillo and Rafael Salazar’s Isugid is driven by the ideas and narratives of members of the SOMA based businesses and organizations: Arkipelago Books, Bayanihan Community Center, Bindlestiff Studio, South of Market Community Action Network, and West Bay Pilipino Multi-Service Center.

 

Isugid comic book available while supplies last at Arkipelago Books.

 

API Cultural Center's Annual

United States of Asian America Fest

Takes Over Bindlestiff!

May 4 - June 9

 

 

USAAF returns to Bindlestiff! This year’s theme, Regenerative Community, explores what the API community does in order to care for ourselves, our community, and our culture. The festival highlights our collective regenerative practices - how they have evolved and how they are vital to our sustainability, including historical traumas Asians and Pacific Islanders have faced and how they have shaped our history, our culture, and present. The theme also mines how we as a community address these traumas and work towards a future of healing and restorative justice. Most poignantly, our festival programs investigate how the API community renews and sustains its drive and passion to be artists, organizers, cultural workers, and community leaders in the face of oppression.

 

INCARCERATED 6x9 (May 4-13, Fridays & Saturday, 7:30pm. Sundays, 3:00pm. $20) is the latest work by Alleluia Panis, performed by 10 dancers to music by Rachel Lastimosa and filmmaker Wilfred Galila Fri-Sun May 4-13, 2018 at Bindlestiff Studio in SF's Filipino Cultural District. Exploring the hopes, delusions and the ultimate will to survive in the loneliest, most bitter place on the planet, 6x9 is inspired by the real-life accounts of incarcerated young Pinoy/Asian Americans. The bold, physically and emotionally layed work of fiction located in the year 2048, 150 years after the US pursuit of global power began.

 

 

Model Minorities Don't Cry (May 18-19, Friday & Saturday, 8pm. $12.00) is a stand-up comedy show featuring Bay Area comedians Irene Tu and Andrew Orolfo. In it, Irene and Andrew separately tell jokes about their childhoods and current lives. They explore what it means to grow up Asian in America, living up to expectations of model minorities, and past trauma. By sharing their stories, they hope to start a conversation and dispel the stereotype that Asians and Asian Americans aren't allowed to show or talk about their feelings.

 

 

Bad Trip
A shadow play.

 

Friday May 25, 8pm

Saturday May 26, 4pm & 8pm

Sunday May 27, 4pm

Written by: Rupert Estanislao; Adapted by: TJ Basa; Directed by: Aureen Almario; Illustrated by: England Hidalgo; Music by: Lian Ladia; Produced by: Judith Ferrer

 

Presented by: Brownout Productions, a collective of artists that is rooted in Bindlestiff Studio.

 

 

Memorya (June 9, 5pm & 8pm. $15-25 Sliding Scale) weaves voices of elders and emerging artists into narratives of collective strength and wisdom. Performances explore stories of working class Filipinos balancing tensions between blood and chosen family, displacement and belonging. While queer elders guide younger generations, music is a portal to the spirit world, and dance is a meditation on migration, love and gender identity. As we honor the healing journeys that take place within community, we make space for the present, the future and the past. Kreatibo has used video, movement and multimedia performance to center Queer Filipin@ diaspora since 2003.

 

 

Stories High 18 Writing Workshops Begin May 27

 

Stories High returns for its 18th installment! Bindlestiff's longest-running production series once again nurtures work from page to the stage, culminating in our fully-staged production, August 16-25.

 

Writing Workshop: Meets every Sunday, May 27 - July 8, 11am-2pm @ Bindlestiff Studio

 

In the Stories High Writing Workshop, students will be introduced to the craft of writing for the theater. With lecture, weekly assignments, and in-class writing exercises, students will grasp the fundamental concept of scene structure, action, events, voice, and dialogue. Assignments will include analyzing produced play scripts and on-site workshop of student work, while also engaged in their practice of the writing process, risk-taking, and refining their narrative vision. Students are expected to develop a ten page one act and will receive an individual consultation with the instructor. In collaboration with Stories High actors, directors, and producers, fully developed scripts are eligible for inclusion in the Bindlestiff Stories High stage production.

 

Tuition for entire course: $100-$250, sliding scale. (Limited number of tuition waivers available for those in need and residents/community workers of SOMA).

 

To sign-up please email storieshigh@bindlestiffstudio.org

 

Note: Workshop size capped at 15 participants. Eligible participants can only miss one class. 

We are thrilled to have Bindlestiff alum Christina Ying return as this year's Writing Workshop facilitator. Christina earned her MFA at Northwestern University in Writing for the Screen and Stage. She was also a fellow with the Sewanee Writers Conference and the Kenyon Playwrights Conference. Christina has had over a decade-long theater career with Bindlestiff Studio as a resident artist, and for the past two years has been the playwright facilitator for their Stories High workshop. It was with Bindlestiff that she made her theatrical writing debut with her monologue, "The Word of Oprah" in 2010. Her full-length play and graduate thesis, There’s the Moon and Then There’s You world premiered at Bindlestiff Studio on May 30, 2015.

 

 

Introducing Our Newest Board Member:

Voltaire Gungab

 

Please join Bindlestiff in welcoming our newest Board Member: Voltaire Gungab.

 

Voltaire brings to the Board artistic expertise derived from many years of work as an actor, dancer, producer and director. He has a BA degree in Speech and Drama from the University of the Philippines, and an MA in Speech and Theater Arts from Northwestern University. He has served on the boards of Asian American Arts Foundation, Asian Pacific Islander Cultural Center, and the Gay Asian Pacific Alliance (GAPA). He was GAPA Cultural Chair for seven years and was the Artistic Director of GAPA Dance Company. He also has 20+ years of experience in advertising and marketing. Before he retired last year, Voltaire worked at a research center at UCSF. Currently, he works with community organizations and Filipino dance companies in SF and Stockton. He hopes to impact Bindlestiff's Board in the areas of networking and promotions.

 

Bindlestiff is grateful to have such a warm, caring, and wise addition to our SOMA Pilipinas community. Welcome Voltaire!

 

 

AROUND THE BARANGAY

April 19 - KSW's 45th Anniversary Gala

April 24  SoMagpahal Youth Photo Mentorship Exhibitions, SOMArts Ramp Gallery

April 27-29  "Baybayin" by Kristian Kabuay @ STARTUP ART FAIR

May 16  "SHE, WHO CAN SEE" AT CAAMFEST 2018

May 19 SoMa Barrio Fiesta 2018, Gene Friend Rec Center, VOLUNTEERS NEEDED