a farm for meme

written by Elena Araoz, Virginia Grise, and BT Hayes - July 30, 2020

a farm for meme is a virtual story project chronicling the destruction of the South Central Farm in Los Angeles, California. The South Central Farm was one of the largest urban farms in the United States. A communal garden of 14 acres, built in a vacant lot in an industrial part of South Los Angeles in the wake of the 1992 LA Rebellion, the farm became the center of controversy when the city sold the land to developer Ralph Horowitz who eventually evicted the farmers from their garden. The farmers disputed the validity of the sale in court and staged a series of protests, including a protest encampment at the farm.

You can find Howlround Theatre Commons’s archived footage of both the Spanish and English language productions here.

Written by Viginia Grise in the middle of today's rebellion, directed virtually by Elena Araoz during a global pandemic, a farm for meme is a poetic non-linear monologue based on real events and people. The lead monologist Marlene Beltran performs from her home in Los Angeles, portraying a character who is searching for groundedness when home isn’t enough. The character speaks about her friend Vanessa, a single mother who lived on the South Central Farm encampment with her three small children

The piece takes handmade aesthetics and weaves them within a digital landscape. The organic landscape of the farm blossoms on screen through puppetry, performed throughout by Katharine Matthias, Minjae Kim, and BT Hayes. With an emphasis on exploration and play in the process, the company works to discover and illuminate theatricality through a computer screen.

There were four free live broadcast performances of a farm for meme on August 1-2, 2020.

a farm for meme was produced in association with allgo, Cara Mía Theatre, and Innovations in Socially Distant Performance.

You can find our interview with Virginia Grise here.