Jaimie Warren Interview, May 15, 2020

SEGMENT SYNOPSIS: Humanities Truck fellow Naoko Wowsugi interviews artist Jaimie Warren. Jaimie shares how COVID has impacted her life and work. She discusses how two of the largest-scale projects she's ever done have been interrupted by the virus, and reflects on how she and her team are adapting to do one (an exhibition and community musical) virtually with students. SUBJECTS: COVID-19; (Brooklyn, New York); (Waukesha, Wisconsin)

Starting... Okay, cool.

Yeah, okay, anytime you want to.

Okay, cool, I know I keep yawning. Alright. So, my name is Jaimie Warren and I am an artist and I also co-direct a community arts project and fake public access TV show called Whoop-De-Doo. And so I'm going to talk a little bit about how coronavirus has affected me. I was invited to do this by my friend Naoko Wowsugi.

So I am an artist that has been living and working in Brooklyn, New York. And I was on the path to two of my largest-scale projects by far that I had ever been invited to participate in. One is a solo institutional exhibition at a space called Pioneer Works in Brooklyn. My project was called The Miracle and that was, that had opened to the public in February, late February 2020. And it was all culminating in a giant community musical in a very immersive space, which is a haunted forest and oversized bedroom. So that was to be presented to the public in mid-April. And we shut, those space shut down in late March. And it's a project I've been working on for the past year. So that is currently on pause. And a little bit undetermined.

And then Whoop-De-Doo was on course to do their largest-scale project by far to date, which was through the Fort Mason Center for Arts and Culture in San Francisco. We were doing a giant community, or excuse me, a giant haunted house for the community at Fort Mason. So that is currently cancelled, or currently postponed, probably most likely cancelled. And with The Miracle at Pioneer Works, that project, we are currently in process of completely restructuring it, assuming it doesn't get canceled and that the stay at home orders don't continue to get extended for an very lengthy amount of time.

So I want everything to be done in a very safe way. And I want to go by the rules, of course, but we're still trying to figure out how we restructure this community project in a way that can still get kids involved, but have them not be physically in this space. So basically, we've been conducting workshops and creating narrative and working with these kids for months to make this giant musical. Making sets and props and costume, developing narrative, and now we're restructuring it to perhaps, what we're thinking about right now is all the artists are in the space, and we create videos based on the artistic decisions and direction that the students give us through a series of online workshops through Zoom. And we create an end product just based on ideas that they throw our way and, and, and direct us to do. And maybe ideally over the summer or over the months, right now it's mid May., we're hoping that it can culminate into something a little more performative or maybe they can even be a part of the videos, we're not sure. But having them be able to trickle in slowly if the stay at home orders start to ease up over these months. But basically having to have the programming be totally flexible and open, and just trying to continue to take these hurdles and try and have a creative, you know, different creative outcome or idea for each hurdle we might come across.

So I, not too long after the stay at home orders, I ran, I tucked tail and ran back home to Wisconsin to a very conservative community and a very conservative family. So I've been here for almost two months. I had somewhat of a, maybe you might consider, an alarmist friend that kind of convinced me that the city was going to shut down, there was a high risk for a really huge outbreak that was overwhelming to the city, that could cause potential violence or even rioting and not being able to take a plane out of town. I got very scared about it and went home where there was very little outbreaks.

And now I'm at this interesting, and this is actually the day after the Wisconsin Supreme Court overruled the governor's or the mayor's, I'm sorry, Evers' May 26 stay at home order. So, today, everything opened to the public. My mom got a haircut. My sister works at a bar. The bars are opening, they're crowding, everyone's celebrating by getting wasted and being really close together.

So now I feel that I don't know what to do. I'm in the middle of Wisconsin where everything's going to explode. My parents are conservative, they're Trump fans, and they are pretty sure that the coronavirus is a conspiracy against Trump and it's a joke. And they're, it's way over inflated and all the other, like, car accidents and shark attacks are all being labeled as coronavirus in order to overthrow the president. So I can't quite tell what the, where is a better place to be right now, is in New York where everyone's still at stay at home orders, stay at home orders and masked and being safe, but I have a tiny apartment and three roommates and it's a very tense scenario there? Here, it's very, I have a ton of space, giant house, giant yard, I'm in a farmland, the weather's nice, I can be outdoors. And nobody even close to me besides my family. So very chaotic, or not chaotic, but very polar opposite scenarios.

You know, basically what's kept me going is I'm really focused on my work. I'm trying to be able to get outside, exercise. I have therapy that I can call, I can call my therapist still weekly, every week and kind of spew all the stress out on her. Thank you, Jackie.

And I'm hoping you know, what, what do I hope we can learn from this crisis? I mean, only time will tell. The fake news is, you know, I'm not, I don't know how I even word this, but the idea of fake news and how that's been thrown out there and really exploded is seemingly very detrimental because this is no longer political. This is at the risk of people's health. And as someone who does believe the coronavirus is very real and how I've seen that it's overtaken New York and how much it's affected people, and overwhelmed hospitals, and killed emergency room doctors, ah, gets me, like, emotional even thinking about that. But it's scary times that we're in and doesn't seem like it's going to get better anytime soon. So just hoping that we can learn to figure out ways to find reliable sources of information and really, always stay consistent with being honest and truthful. And knowing that we can have sources that we believe in because it's going to become more and more important, because as times get scarier and scarier, and as the internet becomes more powerful, a more powerful way to reach people and to manipulate information.

And also, I've learned to really hold your friends tightly because you need your community. I'm, I don't, my family has complete polar opposite views as me and I'm a single person. So friends are the most important to me. Where I'm going to need them so that we can run off to a commune together and like figure out how to grow vegetables or hunt squirrels or something. Naoko if you're hearing this, I hope you're one of us.

So, yeah, don't take your community lightly. Like, appreciate them for everything you have because, or and if you are close with your family hold them dearly, too. Because, I might be getting a little alarmist myself, but it's scary times. So take it seriously, and do what you can, and stay healthy.