Jay Délise
Jay Délise (she/they) is a writer, theater artist, and producer based in Harlem, New York. She has performed at The United Nations, The Schomburg Center, The Pulitzer Center, and Carnegie Hall. Her work has been highlighted around the world and in publications including Afropunk, Broadway World, Vagabond City, Glass Poetry Press, and Huffington Post.
Jay is a poet and a teaching artist, but more importantly, she is Black and magic.
During her time as a CRITICAL BREAKS Artist in Residence, Jay will continue the development of &&&Art, an “exact” and “historically accurate” re-telling of the human artistic experience. It seeks to break down and convey what it’s like to create art in today's world through caricature. Featuring “expert” practitioner of the performing arts, Sapphire Craouwtch, &&&Art is a multimedia bouffon piece of documentary excrement theater that laughs at the commercialization of te theater in America.
“My love for DADA and Bouffon stems from the way it explains the problems of the world by using their ingredients. Using this theory, I decided to find a way to materialize my issues: The Popular American Theatre, The Broadway Industrial Complex, and how these systems force artists to participate in the commercialization of art which prioritizes endless mass production of content to be consumed.
What kept pushing me forward in the creation of this work was the removal of the thing I was speaking to excellence. I used this project to follow the stories my memories were telling and allowed the ghosts of these institutions to speak directly to the camera.
So through this work, and in my small-scale practice, I want to remind myself and other artists that we are more than our relationships to historical events, or tragedies, we ourselves are enough to write about. I wanted to encourage art for art’s sake, and help eliminate the idea that we as artists are only worthy if we are profitable, and profitable only when our art is topical.”
— Jay Délise
Image courtesy of Jay Délise.
