Sea-Saw

Sea-Saw is an all-new art series featuring six genre-bending artists showcasing their bold, eclectic & interactive work. Sea-Saw takes place every Tues & Wed, Jul 24-Aug 29 @ the West End of the Pier.
Picture yourself staring off into the ocean. Envision the peacefulness and inspiration of the ocean sparkling beneath the sun. Now call to mind the feeling of enormity that is evoked by these waves crashing at night, the foreboding nature into which this massive body transforms when it’s dark. In its most beautiful moments beneath a full moon, the ocean is a glimmering black sheet of impossibly large motion. At its most intimidating, it is a thin membrane separating life on this plane from a mysterious and barely known universe beneath us. In every case, the ocean is a moment of wonder.
Los Angeles is a final place that human beings can travel – and inhabit – before reaching the Pacific Ocean. LA is also the final resting place of many dreams, both realized and incomplete. To overlook the ocean in Los Angeles is to ponder the aspirations and secret thoughts of many generations of dreamers, and the furthest point one can chase those dreams beneath the setting sun is the Santa Monica Pier, perched upon that ocean.
At the end of this Pier is a set of bleachers looking down on the last performance arena in the City – the furthest west stage there is in the land where dreams are made. At the top of these bleachers is a room that is wrapped three-quarters of the way with windows, and because of its location at the westernmost tip of the pier that is LA’s endpoint, the view from this room depicts one thing from every vantage point: the ocean.
For Sea-Saw, we’ve selected seven artists and performance collectives to immerse themselves and our guests into the idea of walking to the end of one’s dreams, or the collective concept of dreaming itself. What happens when you reach the furthest possible point of your waking aspirations, or discover the meaning of a recurring dream that visits you every few nights? To reflect more wholly upon these ideas, we’ve lined the fourth wall with mirrors to completely immerse the room in a fully surrounded ocean. The fact that this fourth wall also becomes a reflection of audience members as they engage each piece is an irony not lost on us, or our performers.
These performances take place twice a week, featuring three modes during every single show: daylight, sunset, and nighttime. We hope the physical transformation inside the room will be reflected by audiences and performers, just as much as it will by the mirrors.