Squonk Opera will perform “Pneumatica” on Sunday, Sept. 27, at 3 p.m. and 5 p.m. and Monday, Sept. 28, at 10 a.m. and 11:30 a.m. in the parking lot of the Wake Forest Renaissance Centre for the Arts, 405 S. Brooks St. These outdoor concerts are free and open to the public.
As a special bonus on Sept. 27, several food trucks will park along Elm Avenue from 2 to 6 p.m. Area residents of all ages are encouraged to bring a lawn chair, enjoy the variety of delicious foods and experience what is sure to be an unforgettable show of incredible sights and sounds.
“Pneumatica” is an event about air, made of air and powered by air. From their interactive set and stage, the Squonkers pump up the volume with live original music that permeates the air, while inflatables pump up and immerse the audience.
Incorporating elements of street theater and pop-up art installation, “Pneumatica “ embraces new materials and technologies with a wind-powered concert enlivened by shapes and objects that inflate, sway, sag, expand and contract.
Figures and tentacles grow, powered by blowers and vortex fans and culminate in the center attraction – “Lady Pneumatica” – a 40-foot-tall big blue lady who incorporates a spinning wind turbine atop her head. She blossoms with sails, breathing steam and raising her inflated arms to the sky.
Squonk’s music incorporates the swoops and eddies of air with electronic bagpipes and a vertical accordion that is Lady Pneumatica’s lungs, played like a piano while it rises and falls with her breath. Playing with visual puns, air is used to activate costumes as Squonkers inflate like blowfish and musically activate headtubes with wild guitar and bass riffs.
With the creation of Pneumatica, the Squonkers effectively continue to pursue the most American and democratic of art forms: the public celebration complete with boisterous music and surreal imagery. Squonk taunts and whispers, bellows and caresses, using the very medium of sound: air.
For more information about the Sept. 27 and 28 concerts, visit www.wakeforestnc.gov/squonk-opera.aspx or contact Renaissance Centre Manager Cathy Gouge at 919-435-9567 or cgouge@wakeforestnc.gov.
To learn more about Squonk Opera, visit www.squonkopera.org/.
