SALOMANIA

UPDATE: After a successful residency at the Catwalk Institute in Catskill, NY, in June 2024, I was invited to return to the Institute in spring 2025 along with my Citizen Arts collaborators for the final stage of Salomania’s development. This stay at Catwalk will be followed by a  presentation of Salomania in the Hudson Valley in May 2025! So grateful for the opportunity! If you want to help support our upcoming production, please consider donating to Citizen Arts!

In January 2024, I workshopped my ideas for Salomania with several artists from the NYC theatre community, including Daniel Irizarry, Michael Mullen, Rick DesRochers, Wilson Hernandez, Cynthia LaCruz, Keith Michael Pinault, and Tony Torn. Lehmann College’s Theater Department hosted us on campus. Together, we explored characters mostly through movement and vocal work. We regularly turned to the visual materials I have been working with—the medical photos and illustrations of hysterics from the nineteenth century—as well as the representations of Salome in visual art and popular entertainment to inform our choices.

Pencil sketch of woman on bed in a back bed. Head on pillow, hands clenched.

Paul Richer, Études cliniques sans grand hysterie (1881).

White man seated on floor, leading forward with red shirt and black pants. White man with blue shirt and black pants, on right in back band balanced on the shoulders of seated man.

Keith Michael Pinault (L) and Michael Mullen (R). Photo: Maria Sanchir.

 

Salomania Workshop: January 2024. Michael Mullen and Keith Michael Pinault. Directed by Meg Araneo. Videography by Maria Sanchir and Alejandro Castro.

 
White man blueThree people standing in circle. Each has right should raised as though copying each other's movement. Three back wooden cubes around them.. Three black chairs in the upper left corner. White walls and floor.

Michael Mullen (L), Meg Araneo (C), and Keith Michael Pinault (R). Photo: Maria Sanchir.

Three people sitting on floor in semi-circle: white man in blue shirt and black pants, woman in black tank top and black pants, man in maroon top and black pants. All are barefooted. Papers on floor in front of men. Woman has pink laptop on floor..

Michael Mullen (L), Meg Araneo (C), and Keith Michael Pinault (R). Photo: Maria Sanchir.

Want to help support our upcoming production? Please donate Citizen Arts!