COLLABORATIVE PROJECTS // FIBERS // PERFORMANCE // WRITING
Things That Survived The Winter
In Development
Things That Survived The Winter is a project sponsored by Fractured Atlas. Fractured Atlas is a 501(c)(3) public charity. Contributions for the purposes of Things That Survived The Winter are tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law.
CLICK HERE TO GIVE A TAX DEDUCTIBLE DONATION THROUGH FRACTURED ATLAS
“Things That Survived The Winter” is a social-creative enterprise designed to reach persons suffering from chronic illness: a valuable tool to both improve their lives and spark broader public conversations about the costs and compromises involved in living with health problems often considered “invisible.” The project hopes to provide both active and passive exploration of the experience of chronic illness through multidisciplinary performance and related social arts workshops. By design it combines communal storytelling, aerial acrobatics, music, and visual art to summon examples of recovery and resilience in the face of physical and emotional hardship. Core performers would offer concept-based arts workshops in their disciplines, presenting opportunities for participants to connect through a unique and positive experience, express their difficulties through mediated art forms, and to realize more depth, nuance, and purpose behind their common challenges.
DEVELOPED SCENE LIST:
Allegiant
Zombie Bodies
The Apocalypse Rewind
Reflection
Continuous Deforming Landscape
Infinity Labyrinth
Waves (in progress)
Infinity Labyrinth - Conceived as part of "Things That Survived The Winter". As developed and performed in Circus Sessions, produced by Femmes de Feu, and led by artist-mentor Marie-Andree Robitaille. Costume and concept by Sarah Muehlbauer. Harbourfront Theatre, Toronto, ON 2018.
Continuous Deforming Landscape - A solo performance with community involvement, designed for "Things That Survived The Winter". Performance, concept, and costume by Muehlbauer. Music by Rexedog. Performed in a works-in-progress night at the Philadelphia School of Circus Arts, for integration with Infinity Labyrinth. May 2018.
A House for Birds
2014- Ongoing
A unique storytelling experience uniting performance art, text, and environment, "A House for Birds" is built wherever the branches connect. Using original writing by myself, and quoted text from authors Herman Hesse, Shakespeare, and the Tao to frame a performance art happening, this solo performance piece bridges genres and poses questions to progressive permaculture enthusiasts. How do we claim ownership of "home", and how are our hearts tied to natural resources?
Built for and staged at the opening of Beacon Food Forest and other environmental/ social projects, "A House For Birds" features an Intermission Act commissioning series that was test- piloted in 2014 in Seattle and Philadelphia. Local artists are chosen to split the show and perform mid-way through. The work was developed during an artist residency at Peñasco Theatre (NM). It will be re-performed at the opening of Fairmount Food Forest in Philadelphia (in development).
Built for and staged at the opening of Beacon Food Forest and other environmental/ social projects, "A House For Birds" features an Intermission Act commissioning series that was test- piloted in 2014 in Seattle and Philadelphia. Local artists are chosen to split the show and perform mid-way through. The work was developed during an artist residency at Peñasco Theatre (NM). It will be re-performed at the opening of Fairmount Food Forest in Philadelphia (in development).
Wind at my Back
2012
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This 50-minute original performance installation tells a surreal story of critical moments and biographic reflection. Conceptually seeded, co-written, facilitated, and produced by myself, this open-structured collaborative piece seamed together original work by over 30 artists and artisans. It began with a community prompt to collect childhood memories of home and place, which were incorporated into the life history of the main character, Hollis. Out of these precious and poetic moments, we crafted a collective human experience that was both real and universal, with poetic overlays built through original music, aerial choreography, storytelling, and visual art.
Equipment and rigging provided by the Philadelphia School of Circus Arts and Give and Take Jugglers. Music by Gemini Wolf. Tensile Fabric set design/ installation by Broken Arrow Workshop. Performers and choreographers: Rose Bonjo, Niff Nichols (lead), Jackie Zalewski, Meg Skill, Peter Smith. Visual Artists Emily Davidson, Jovana Sarver, Lindsay Wallace. Co-writers Dan Schein, Leslie Friedman, Yolanda Ho, Jovana Sarver. Photography by Jason M Photographics. <<Read about WAMB in "Sarah Muehlbauer Takes Plasticity and Memory Up in the Air" by Nicholas Gilewicz for Philadelphia Fringe>> |
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Circus Bomb The Southwest
Photos from our fun, indie recreational tour of the beautiful Southwest, with Jess Flying Yogi and family. Read Blog Post
Photos from our fun, indie recreational tour of the beautiful Southwest, with Jess Flying Yogi and family. Read Blog Post
Specter Animalia
2010
Graduate Thesis
I spent much of my second year at Tyler School of Art investigating dyed and sewn plastics in performance---with the material as a metaphor for human desire to transform nature and to go beyond it's "limited" organic form. Humans are messy and dark and full of love and pain, and often we wish to transcend our "less desirable" aspects and our limitations. However we must always ask, "By what means, and at what cost?" Inspired by Roland Barthes "Mythologies" and his eloquent writing on plasticity, I explored this concept with fierce dance collaborator and artist Colleen Hooper through sculpture and video. By installing cut, sewn, dyed, and constructed "natural forms" using plastic, juxtaposed with the human body, we wrote a performative and mediated installation and video project. The gallery audioscape was dictated by the sound of a sleep/ noise machine. Meanwhile, a short video combining dance, sculpture, and a recorded narrative entered a reflection on car and desk culture, and distance from the wild. These themes seem just as vital today as ever, as humans increasingly realize the weight that plastic bears on the fate of our planet and the lives of all living beings.
The Walnut Lane Bridge Project
2009-2010
A 3-part series of site-specific video collaborations between myself and dancer/choreographers Nikki Roberts & Briel Driscoll with sound designer Cory Neale ("Forces of Friction"), as well as dancer/ choreographers Beau Hancock & Colleen Hooper ("Arches"), and my own solo performance ("Para"). This project was built out of the framework of the Walnut Lane Bridge (Germantown neighborhood, Philadelphia) and was filmed in the year of its centennial anniversary. The bridge itself was the world's largest poured-concrete structure at the time. This mark of human accomplishment contains the impure history of the tragic death of multiple workers during its construction, that occurred during the move of the falsework to pour the second arch. In our modern interpretation, we read our history and responded more viscerally to the site as it presented itself to us. This collection was highly improvisational in nature.
