Masks and Ritual at the Sedona Public Library

Sedona AZ (May 6, 2013) – The Sedona Public Library will host “The Body Reclamation Project Performance” on Sunday May 19th. There will be one showing at 1:00 PM, doors open at 12:30 PM. A follow up, day-long mask making workshop will be held the following Saturday, May 25th. Workshop details on request.

“The Body Reclamation Project” is a culmination of over 15 years experimentation and exploration by performance artist and mask maker Pash Galbavy. It is part improvisation, storytelling, movement, dance, mask-art, myth, and personal and collective healing ritual.

In the performance, Pash shares about her own challenges to be at home in her body. In doing so, she touches on issues faced by many in our western culture on the journey into, and through adulthood. She brings masks to life as the embodiment of archetypal characters–such as the Rebel, Pleaser, Prostitute, and Saboteur–that are encountered both within and without. Traversing pleasure and peril, from promiscuity, to violence, to eating disorders, to nude modeling, the body is the landscape where inner and outer struggles converge. Pash offers hope that a way back to ourselves can be found by learning to listen and respond to our own inner calling, however strange its voice may seem.

Galbavy says: “The positive responses to the performance have been overwhelming. People keep asking when I’ll do another. The show is improvised. I bring a variety of masks depending on what characters I want to work with, so every time is different.”

After the show, participants are invited to share their own thoughts, reflections and reactions to what they’ve seen. Galbavy says: “Often people are shaken up afterwards, so it’s a great opportunity for them to express too. I work in a circle. I like sharing the space with people and having an interactive experience related to subjects that are common to everyone.”

The day-long May 25th mask making workshop will offer participants the opportunity to make their own Body Reclamation masks and explore their own stories in more depth. It will be imbued with the values and attitudes of the Person-Centered Approach, which emphasizes conditions of positive regard, empathy, and genuineness. There will be no expectation or agenda other than self-and-mask-discovery.

Pash’s creative offerings incorporate her investigations into expressive dance, movement, and art as per studies with dance artist Anna Halprin, expressive artist Natalie Rogers, and theater artist Rhodessa Jones. They contain elements of the archetypal imagery of psychologist Carl Jung and mystic Carolyn Myss. They mix components that include the little-known practices of authentic movement, psychodrama, and voice dialog.

Pash is an expressive artist, contact improvisational dancer, author, and artists’ model. She has an MA in Communication Studies. She is the recipient of numerous artist grants including several from the Arizona Commission of the Arts and two from the City of Sedona–the later including one for community mask making. She and husband Marty Landa developed the first of its kind natural mask-making kit with an Australian government grant. She gives mask making workshops, the most recent of which was for an April mentoring project at West Sedona Elementary School. She initiated the Peace Prayers Project 2003, where participants made life-sized masks representing their visions of peace in honor of 9/11. These were exhibited at Goldenstein Gallery. Pash has performed at numerous festivals, and public and private events in the US and Australia. She recently offered a short version of the Body Reclamation Project for the Sedona Mentoring Circle, a cross generational project that offers mentoring to young teen girls. The show is also scheduled to be performed this year at the Phoenix Center for the Arts and also possibly in Los Angeles.

The Body Reclamation Project is sponsored in part by the Sedona Sacred Dance Guild, and World Peace Dance. Donated proceeds will help bring the premiere of the World Peace Dance to Sedona in 2014.

“The Body Reclamation Project – Performance” will be presented at the Sedona Public Library, located at 3250 White Bear Road in Sedona on Sunday, May 19th at 1:00 PM. Tickets are a suggested donation of $10 – $25 and are available at the door for starting at 12:30 PM.

“The Body Reclamation Project – Mask Making Workshop” will be offered in Sedona on Saturday May 25th. Workshop details available on request.

For more information contact 928 284-4021, pash@unmaskit.com, or see www.unmaskit.com.