Community Action Center

Artists featured on the soundtrack include Mx Justin Vivian Bond, Tri-State Area with AV Linton, Chicks on Speed, Nick Hallett with Sam Greenleaf Miller, Electrelane, Light Asylum, Effi Briest, NGUZUNGUZU, Lesbians On Ecstasy, MEN, Sergei Tcherepnin, Thee Majesty, Kinski, Chateau featuring K8 Hardy and MOTHERLAND. As an archive of relationships built on collaboration, friendship, sex, and art, Community Action Center sought to expose and reformulate paradigms typical of porn typologies, intentionally exploiting tropes for their comical value, critical consideration, and historical homage. Reflecting on the cultural realness of homo-grown lesbian sexuality, the work aimed to be a hedonistic and distinctly political adventure.

** honorifically borrowed from Chris Vargas’ project MOTHA, chrisevargas.com/motha

Light Industry will host a screening of the film Community Action Center on October 16.

Community Action Center: Soundtrack Release is organized by Matthew Lyons, Curator.

BIOS

Following their early 1990s cabaret debut, the earth-shaking powerhouse that is Mx Justin Vivian Bond has taken on many roles: provocateur, Broadway and cinema star, pop chanteuse, Tony nominee, opera singer, futuristic trendsetter, transgender trailblazer, activist, memoirist, and the unforgettable voice of Kiki DuRane, one half of the generation-defining performance duo Kiki and Herb. An Obie, GLAAD, and Bessie Award winner, Bond's three decades as one of downtown's most prominent and influential raconteurs have earned them respect from all corners of the art world.

Shannon Funchess is an activist and self-taught, interdisciplinary queer performance artist. The founder, vocalist, producer of internationally revered, electronic music project LIGHT ASYLUM founded in Brooklyn, New York in 2007, she has engaged audiences in performance at DIY art spaces, museums, galleries, music festivals and nightclubs in the U.K., North America, Europe, South America, Scandinavia, Japan, Russia, Mexico, Australia and Canada. Her musical journey began in a gospel choir of a southern baptist church in Spokane, Washington at the age of nine. With an ethos rooted in community and a passion for collaboration, she has joined forces with artistic peers and allies globally. From recording studio vocal features, remixes, production for artists The Knife, LEECH, Yves Tumor, TR/ST and Chris Garneau among others to lending vocals and appearing as an actor in the artist's video installation works of Elysia Crampton Chuquimia, Michelle Handleman, Gloria Maximo, Wu Tsang, A.K. Burns and A.L. Steiner. She has regularly been invited on stages as a guest performer / musician with artists the likes of The Knife, LCD Sound System, TV on the Radio, electronic music pioneer Laurie Anderson, Coco Rosie and Christeene. Funchess has established herself as a force across her community and is lauded for her cathartic performances as well as a DJ at art and underground events. She’s at home in all stages of her creative exploration and continues to produce music and art within her community in Portland, Oregon.

A.K. Burns is an interdisciplinary artist and educator based in New York. Using video, installation, sculpture, drawing, and collaboration, Burns explores systems of value and the body as a contentious domain wherein socio-political issues are negotiated. Recent exhibitions include a solo exhibition at the Wexner Center for the Arts, OH in 2023 and forthcoming at The Henry Art Gallery, WA. A frequent collaborator; Burns is a co-founding member of W.A.G.E (Working Artists in the Greater Economy) among other projects. Burns is an Associate Professor and MFA Co-Director at Hunter College.

Brooklyn-based artist A.L. Steiner utilizes constructions of photography, video, installation, collage, collaboration, performance, writing and curatorial work as seductive tropes channeled through the sensibility of a skeptical queer ecofeminist androgyne. Steiner is co-curator of Ridykeulous, co-founder of Working Artists and the Greater Economy (W.A.G.E.) and is a serial collaborator. She is Faculty at Yale University's School of Art.