Xwing

Xwing was founded in 2004 by Nicholas Lowe and Members of the Chicago based company European Repetory Company. The Ubu Worshops group came together initially in July 2004 to begin reading texts by Alfred Jarry with the initial aims to explore texts by avant-garde writers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Through the workshops, puppetry, masks, basal comedy and folk style drama were drawn into collision through Lowes adaptation of Alfred Jarry's text 'The Black Minutes of Memorial Sand'. The rich persona of Alfred Jarry introduces a 'Puppet Show' where Pa Ubu installs himself in the household of the kindly and unsuspecting Mr. Achras. There ensues a symbolist drama with the inevitable murderous results.

Alfred Jarry's book, The Black Minutes of Memorial Sand (Le Minutes De Sable Mémorial) was first published in 1894 as a collection of prose, poetry and a play text called Puppet Show (Guignol). Jarry later developed the play text into what is now known as Ubu Cocu, the second play of the Ubu trilogy, first performed and published in 1944. 'Puppet Show/Guignol' first appeared in English in 2001 translated by Paul Edwards and Antony Melville (in Adventures in Pataphysics: Collected works of Alfred Jarry, Vol. 1. Atlas Press, London). To our knowledge this was the first performance of 'Puppet Show/Guignol' in English and no record exists of a performance in French.

Performances

An initial presentation of material from the Ubu Workshops was made as part of the Intersections series at the Chicago Cultural Centre on November 3.Intersections is a lecture series facilitated by Columbia College Chicago in association with the City of Chicago Office of Cultural Affairs.

The Ubu Workshops culminated in a performance called A Manifest Imposture, which opened for a limited run at the Links Hall as part of the Fall 2004 Linkages series.