Solo Emerging Artist Celebration

Three groundbreaking, local solo artists — Antonio Duke, A.P. Looze and Ifrah Mansour — perform solo pieces in repertory in the Guthrie’s first-ever Solo Emerging Artist Celebration.

Antonio Duke
Tears of Moons
Through poetry and prose, inspired by An Iliad, Duke embodies victims of racial violence from 1955–2015, chronicling hate crimes against African Americans and exploring mankind’s addiction to violence.

• Saturday, February 24 at 7:30 p.m.
• Thursday, March 1 at 10 a.m.
• Sunday, March 4 at 1 p.m.
• Wednesday, March 7 at 7:30 p.m.
• Saturday, March 10 at 7:30 p.m.

Antonio Duke is an actor and playwright who strives to create stories that embody the black diaspora as authentically as possible. In his writing he focuses on mythology, which possesses “an intimacy and epic quality he’s driven to explore.” Duke is passionate about making ancient stories anew with modern circumstances. A recent graduate of the University of Minnesota/Guthrie Theater B.F.A. Actor Training Program, Duke has worked onstage with Penumbra Theatre, Teatro Del Pueblo, Pillsbury House Theatre, Climb Theatre, Pangea World Theatre, Open Eye Figure Theatre, Mission Theatre Company; Day In, Day Out Productions and Nebraska Shakespeare Festival.

A.P. Looze
Foray Softly
Sometimes you find what you’re looking for, sometimes you don’t, and sometimes you find something else entirely. Follow them on an exploration of foraging, and take a journey to places where the most tender version of self may arise.

• Sunday, February 25 at 1 p.m.
• Thursday, March 1 at 7:30 p.m.
• Sunday, March 4 at 7 p.m.
• Tuesday, March 6 at 7:30 p.m.
• Friday, March 9 at 7:30 p.m.

A.P. Looze is an artist who seeks the truth, and goes on heartfelt and honest adventures to find it. They make work that touches on concepts of spirituality and healing by way of personal narrative, investigation and inquiry of past experience, and whatever is at their fingertips or on their mind. Their work has been performed as part of 20% Theatre Company’s Naked I and Q-Stage, at Queertopia, Patrick’s Cabaret, Bryant Lake Bowl and Madame.

Ifrah Mansour
How to Have Fun in a Civil War
In a captivating refugee story of resilience, Mansour revisits her childhood memories of the 1991 Somali Civil War. Layering poetry, puppetry, video and interviews, she confronts violent history with humor.

• Sunday, February 25 at 7 p.m.
• Wednesday, February 28 at 10 a.m.
• Saturday, March 3 at 7:30 p.m.
• Thursday, March 8 at 7:30 p.m.
• Sunday, March 11 at 1 p.m.

Ifrah Mansour is a Somali multimedia artist, performer and educator who uses art to bridge cultures and generations. “My artwork is informed by my lived experience, and that of my community as Muslim refugees and Somali immigrants.” Mansour binds multiple genres to create multi-sensory artwork that illuminates the invisible stories of immigrants. Her artwork takes the form of plays, poetry, installations, puppetry and community collaborations. Her work has been seen at the Minnesota State Fair and Northern Spark Festival, as well as by primarily East African immigrant youth and elders at educational performances. Recent art and performance works include My Aqal, Somalia’s Balloon, Lablaab the Spill, Isug, Corn for Ayayo, and the films Stray and Can I Touch It currently on display as part of the “I am Somali” exhibition at Minneapolis Institute of Arts.

Programming in the Dowling Studio is supported by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. All tickets to performances that are a part of the Level Nine Series are $9.