Brightest Young Things

all words and photos: Mitchell London

As per our written contract, I called my mother on Sunday night. When asked the standard "What did you do this weekend?" I responded "took pictures of people in red jumpsuits reciting ominous proclamations about American culture in a thick Balkan accent through speakers implanted in makeshift jetpacks."

"I took acid too, honey. Now what did you really do this weekend?"

But I did shoot the jetpack'd performance artists - the Floating Lab Collective - alongside kids in cardboard bombs, men on six-wheeled bikes, and the thunderous syncopation of 40+ women of all ages and backgrounds, whacking away at Brazilian drums. On Saturday, the WPA took DC freak flag out of it's shed, dust it off, and run it all the way up the pole.

The art ran from the explicitly political Washington Peace Center performance of "The Price Is Wrong," wherein performers demonstrated the immense cost of nuclear weapons versus the cost of social programs, to the sublime Gallery O/H performance in which black-clad dancers performed an ode to the person next to you on the sidewalk who won't get off his/her damn cellphone. The event, though sparsely attended, spared no opportunity for energy; the Battala Percussion Band captivated the crowd with their rhythmic onslaught and held them there, entranced, for what could have been an hour or ten minutes. Artomatic went psych with their multiwheeled bike and overt reference to their purpose, making an empty cardboard building burst to life with art.