AN INTERVIEW WITH Mat Bevel is an exercise in the "Search for the Unbelievable Fit." It begins with an artist without a genre, continues through a performance that isn't a production, and ends...well, actually, the problem with an interview with Mat Bevel is that it never really ends. If we've lost you, consider yourself found in the wonderful world at Bevel's level.
Ned Schaper, the Clark Kent behind Mat Bevel's performance artistry, is a mild-mannered sculptor, musician, poet, quasi-mad scientist and founder of the Mat Bevel Institute, a learning place "called an institute so it won't be confused with buildings of less noble causes." Indeed, the warehouse district near South Park Avenue and Broadway is an odd setting for an artist who believes "consumerism is the evil bastard destroying society." He's been hard at work behind those semi-closed doors, assembling a brand new season of Surrealistic Pop Science Theatre under the "quadra-strategic generalship of Four World Headquarters," which basically translates into four all-new, one-hour sketches integrating music, spoken-word art and Schaper's signature sculpture-costumes. He says his second year in the Institute marks the first season he's really made the space his own. "I'm like a physics professor, where I go into the 'magic room' and experiments come out."
The talkative Schaper makes a noble attempt to encapsulate his
work for the uninitiated: "What I do is sort of performance
art, stuff like that, sometimes theater, music...I know what I'm
doing, but it seems all the people in other fields don't."
The idea behind the Institute was to have lectures and workshops
in addition to a permanent home for staged performances. He emphasizes
the importance of having a place where he can do shows on a regular
basis, where segments pop up each time with characters you can
keep track of.
Thus, long-time fans will see the return of a lot of the same creations and characters (now at a population of 60 and growing). He likens his studio to a big garden: "Some plants may be in the back, some uprooted, but each time you come more things have grown. We never mow everything down and start over," which is his way of explaining the difference between his shows and a theatrical production.
"This way I can work with things that have many lives," he continues, describing his "spiritual way of working with junk." He doesn't buy materials, even if it means holding onto pieces for years at a time until he finds the right piece that fits.
"Working with (found) materials has taught me to step out of the way and let things come together." We assume he's returning to an earlier topic regarding physics and the kinetic energy that unintentionally draws connections between seemingly unrelated topics. "No," he gently corrects in a rare literal moment, "I'm talking about holes lining up. It's the search for the unbelievable fit. Things (intrinsically) want to come together.
"It's all about using what you have: Available Resource Technology (ART), which is exactly the opposite of the consumer message." Bevel's resourcefulness and gadgetry promise a fun-filled season of pointed political satire and clever wordplay. But at the heart of his work is a lifestyle he hopes to demonstrate--a dynamic approach in which the caring assemblage of disparate found objects becomes a metaphor for our own creative reconstruction of family and community. Schaper consoles as well as explains, "I don't want to remove art from life by giving it a beginning, middle and end."
