Project Statement & Details
Project Statement
The connections we make with others occur through gestures, conversations, and common interest. The Butterfly Effect looks to explore the potential of the gesture and use it to spark conversation that identifies common interests. Through performance, social engagement, and interactive art, we invite the viewer to share an experience with us.
The artists bring their own internal divulgences of immigration and displacement, mindfulness and the desire to be present and in the moment, and the blending of eastern and western cultures and philosophies into the collaboration. Perspectives and ideas are not competing, but blending together and morphing into a new state of being.
Our efforts will begin here in Los Angeles, in different neighborhoods and art spaces. In the fall we will travel to Tokyo and for several days we will perform and exhibit in front of Japanese audiences. We are not looking for what make these audiences different, but for what makes them the same. What, through gesture, body language, and other non-verbal communication can we convey and communicate to the viewer?
These performances are rooted in movement of the body, and the struggles and compromises of different bodies occupying the same space. Personal and public space becomes one, and individual’s experience become universal. 
About the Artists:
Takeshi Kanemura is a performance artist who utilizes Butoh movements, paint, plastic, and music to create unique moments of collaboration between himself and the audience and with other artists. Born and raised in Okinawa Japan, he has made a home of Los Angeles for most of his life.
http://takeshikanemura.com/
Jacqueline Bell Johnson is a sculptor and installation artist. She relies on craft processes to create large scale constructions that explore themes of skeletal structures, architecture, and feminism. She is from Baltimore, Maryland and has been living and work in LA for the last ten years.
http://jacquelinebelljohnson.com/
https://www.facebook.com/JacquelineBellJohnson
Snezana Petrovic uses performance, video, sculpture, installation art, theatre, and collaboration as ways to explore themes of gender and displacement, ultimately challenging them. She is an internationally exhibited artist and curator. Originally from Yugoslavia, she now resides in Los Angeles.
http://www.snezanapetrovic.com/