[Untitled Miniature]

Created and Performed by Joshua William Gelb

HERE Arts Center and Theater in Quarantine present

March 18th - March 25th

HERE Arts Center | 145 Sixth Avenue, New York, NY 10013

Photos by Maria Barnova

Art is subjective. We don’t see the same thing even when looking at the same object. Plays have been written on the subject particularly as it pertains to Modern Art. Think of [Untitled Miniature] as modern art. We will all see something different.

What we will all see is a naked man in a box. To be more precise, there is a naked, thin, white, middle aged man in a tight 5-sided box approximately 4-feet off the ground covered in some sort of powder in front of a ring light and camera broadcasting to the web. And screens - one with comments streaming in from folks watching on the web as well as folks in the room. Beyond the man in the box is a wall of 9 screens, Brady Bunch style, but if you watch the screens, you cannot see the man in the box live in the flesh. He’s on the screens, most of the time, bit not always live and not always clearly. 

What I saw (which is wholly unique to my experience), began with a quite unexpected visceral reaction to someone trapped and covered in white dust - 9/11. I shook that off as I saw the person squirm around the box, because there was no expression of fear. You can move through the space changing your perspective as you go and listening to Siri or Alexa or some other disembodied female voice read the messages from the chat. Listening to that while watching our man in the box made me annoyed with humanity. It isn't about you right now. What I assume folks thought was witty was really banal and insipid. 

The soundscape changes during the 45-minute session. Sometimes there is white noise which cycles to more industrial sounds and on to nature sounds. As the birdsong wafted through the space, I thought of us all in a zoo staring at one primate or another and the utter cruelty of it. We trap these creatures in small spaces just to stare at them and study them with no thought to how frustrating that existence is for them.

I would be surprised if anyone shared my experience though they shared the time and space with me. This is Art. It will make you think. It will trigger thoughts you didnt know were lingering beneath the surface of your consciousness. You will take away what you bring to it, and perhaps a bit more.

CLICK HERE for tickets.

Review by Nicole Jesson.

Published by Theatre Beyond Broadway on March 21st, 2025. All rights reserved.