Street performance crew looks to push the limits

The Street Theatre Brigade has big aspirations - like boosting Albuquerque's creative economy and artistic pull.

And this grassroots group is looking for more people, so it's holding a meeting from 4 to 6 p.m. today in Popejoy Hall, Room B427. It'll go over all the ridiculous stuff it has always wanted to do in the middle of the street but couldn't because it lacked resources.

"We're going to sort of take the temperature of the creative community and see where the interests lie," founder Laurel Butler said. "Do we want to do circus? Do we want to do politics? Do we want to combine those two? How subversive do we want to get? Where do we want to perform? The great thing about theater is all you need as far as resources is people, space and time."

She said street theater is often associated with acrobats, juggling and clowning, which is prevalent in the streets of Europe. In 2005, Butler studied and performed circus arts in Brazil with a group called Circo Picolino. She said political street theater is a big deal in Latin America, and it was a strong tool in the region's history of social reform.

"That's another aspect we want to explore - how to connect with political organizations and social justice and social action organizations in the community like the Peace and Justice Center," she said. "Or if there's a Food Not Bombs rally going on on campus, we'll spend that week prior developing a piece related to food politics and agribusiness. Because some of the work we do is with post-adjudicated youth, we're not going to do anything tremendously illegal, but we're going to try and push the envelope as much as we can."

UNM student James Blessing said he has always wanted to be a clown, so he's joining the group.

"My cousin went to clown camp, and I didn't, and I was jealous," he said. "I like to street perform. This one time, I was waiting for my laundry to dry, and I sort of know how to juggle, so I set a cup outside and juggled, and I whistled a little tune. I literally got a nickel and dime, bought a little cup of sunshine, because that's all I could afford. You can't even buy candy with that these days."

Street theater impacts the memory in a tremendous way, said UNM student Julie Nagle, a founding member of Blackout comedy troupe. We remember surreal dreams more easily than uneventful ones, just like we remember weird street theater more than some uneventful play, she said.

"If you dream about a normal day flipping burgers, you're not going to remember that," Nagle said.

Butler said New Mexico has a rich creative economy, and people come here for the arts. People with money are beginning to invest more in the arts, she said. The film industry attests to that.

"A little while ago, we were the country of production. We were making things. We were industrial," Butler said. "Then all that stuff got outsourced. Then we became the country of information, producing all this Web stuff .... Now what's going to develop a city most rapidly is going to be its creative economy. The artists and the community cultural development is what are going to make or break its development on the whole."

Street Theatre Brigade meeting

Popejoy Hall, Room B427

Today

4-6 p.m.