Neelu Bhuman, Piro Patton, and Sabrina Wong

Mica Sigourney and Lisa Townsend share the dance theater they've developed as artists-in-residence at CounterPULSE.

​Lisa Townsend's indifference and Mica Sigourney's MASTERWORK collectively illustrate the risks and the rewards of giving artists the support they need to experiment. Townsend and Sigourney are part of the Artist Residency Commissioning Program at CounterPULSE and have developed their dance theater pieces over the past several months. They get rehearsal space, "work-in-progress showings," and a performance venue to make whatever they want. Some artists profit enormously from that freedom, while others use it strictly to indulge themselves. The double-bill of these two works, which concluded Sunday, cover both extremes.

Indifference uses dance theater to explore Albert Camus' The Stranger, the 1942 novel best known as an illustration of existentialism. The title character is Mersault, estranged because of his consummate apathy. Asked by his girlfriend Marie whether he wants to get married, he responds that it doesn't make any difference to him and they can if she wants to. More weightily, when he shoots an innocent man, he offers no explanation why and feels no remorse afterward.

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When idiots talk about wanting to de-fund the arts, Jaap Blonk is the kind of artist that they're angry about. He makes wacky sounds with his mouth and throat and gets paid for it, which could mean that he's un-American, certainly that he's elitist. To quote a comment posted on the YouTube video of Blonk's shown above, "What the hell does this provide to society? Other than nothing?"

With feedback like that, you know Blonk is on to something. (His first name, by the way, is pronounced "yop" -- the guy was apparently born into funny sounds.) As part of a rare U.S. tour (he works in his native Holland), he performed Friday at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in "Soundtracks, Scores, Interactive Animations," continuing SF Cinematheque's 2012 season. Appearing in the intimate Screening Room, Blonk shook us black-clad attendees to our esoteric cores.

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Liz Acosta

​Last Saturday we got sucked into a television set. We were walking through the lobby at CounterPULSE and somehow fell through to the other side. Luckily, we spent our time experiencing a sneak-preview of the supersurreal multimedia dance performance Hotel in a Bottle: On the Other Side, created and directed by Erin Malley.

We don't want to give it away, but it includes motion- and sound-sensored visuals, illusory portals, a sheep, and subliminal investigation. If you are into psychedelic drugs, dreams, or Haruki Murakami's fiction, you'll love it.

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Josue Rivera

DIAmanda Kallas I Dia Dear

​Queer performance art series The News made a powerful debut Tuesday night at SOMArts. The evening offered an array of queer narratives, made even more timely and poignant by the federal appeals court ruling on Proposition 8 handed down that morning. Giving intense performances and showing works-in-progress were DIAmanda Kallas | Dia Dear, La Chica Boom, Peter Max Lawrence, Rotimi Agbabiaka, and Shaunna Vella. We also saw the Brontez Purnell Dance Company and Magic Meals.

Host Kolmel WithLove, a filmmaker and performer who curates The News, started things with her own performance in the gallery space of SOMArts. DIAmanda Kallas and La Chica Boom gave show-stopping performances that truly blew us away.

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Mike Ojeda / All Formz Fun

DIAmanda Kallas II Dia Dear

​LGBT performance art thrives on multiple levels in San Francisco. Trannyshack leads the recurring clubs that are escorting drag into the 21st century. Kirk Read and Larry-bob Roberts head monthly open mic Smack Dab. Local choreographers Laura Arrington and Jesse Hewit push boundaries in their dance pieces and performances. Now SOMArts introduces The News, which is part variety show, part workshop. Curated by Kolmel WithLove, The News contains exciting, bleeding-edge local work.

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China is living through an intellectual and creative dark age. While the nation's economy booms and consumer culture thrives, the totalitarian government has "overhauled" the nation's arts communities to bring them in line with its political dogma. Historical relics and traditions have been destroyed or suppressed because they are seen as obstacles to progress. Yet 5-millennia-old tradition in a country of more than 1 billion people dies hard, and there is an active resistance. This week its name is Shen Yun. The New York-based arts group, whose name translates to "the beauty of divine beings dancing," was formed in 2006 to preserve and present traditional Chinese dance and music. It now has more than 200 performers, including dancers, vocalists, and an orchestra. It performs at the War Memorial Opera House through Sunday.

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Bryan Hewitt

James Coquia's 12 Steps to Dealing with Obsession

​An often-quoted creative motto (and business-commercial cliche) is, "Think outside the box," but this month SOMArts invited 100 artists to perform inside the box -- or, to be more accurate, inside its hole.

"Third Strike: 100 Performances for the Hole" welcomed on Dec. 10 some of the Bay Area's most experimental performers, each putting on a 2-minute work within the confines of "the hole" -- a 100-year-old former mechanics' pit on the floor of the main gallery. Past performances at this time-based art marathon have included a heavy metal band set, ritualistic offerings, and a woman shooting fireworks out of her crotch. This year, Occupy Wall Street, milk, money, nudity, and awkward silences were common motifs.

"We imagine this biennial event as a spectrometer... reflecting contemporary media and popular culture... in a way that is simultaneously intimate and macroscopic," gallery director Justin Hoover said.

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​By picking Carlisle Floyd's Susannah for its eighth production, San Francisco Parlor Opera has cunningly rendered moot your last excuse for not checking out its consistently terrific shows. The company has always performed its chosen operas in their original languages, lack of subtitles be damned -- not that it's necessary to be a polyglot to appreciate the artistry and drama that Parlor Opera packs into its micro-scale productions.

But Floyd hails from South Carolina, and his dark tale of repression and prejudice plays out -- in English -- in the fictitious town of New Hope Valley, Tenn. Company co-founders Patricia Urbano and Cole Grissom bring their talents to the leading roles at the Zellerbach House, and the pair proves no less engaging when we can understand what they're saying. Last weekend the cast managed to shine despite wet weather (read the review here) so if there's no rain for the final two performances we can expect even more.

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Mark Francis

​In her newest show, Cat Lady, performance artist Kristina Wong describes plays as "temporary structures for chaos." This approach to theater is evident in the fitfulness of her work, which jumps between mock improv games, edu-tainment children's shows, fake weddings and water gun attacks like a music video cutting between shots.

This structure enables Wong to cover a variety of subjects within her 80-minute performance, this weekend at ODC. Most notable are her fear of becoming the dreaded archetype of a lonely cat lady, the way in which performance creeps into our daily lives, the strategies of male pick-up artists (or PUA, the acronym used in the professional pick-up community), and her cat Oliver's "urinary violence."

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Julian Cash

"Let there be pleasure on Earth, and let it begin with me," says Annie Sprinkle.

​Annie Sprinkle has made a life of exposing herself -- literally and figuratively -- for three decades. She is a filmmaker, performer, writer, activist, porn actress, and former prostitute. Most recently, Sprinkle and her wife, Beth Stephens, are behind a movement they call ecosexuality, which essentially views the Earth as a gigantic lover to be engaged and respected, rather than a storehouse of materials to be consumed.

This weekend Sprinkle returns to one of her origins at a Halloween-themed party called Masquerotica, a staggering mix of acts and efforts from sex-positive, performance, and musical communities. Sprinkle will be joined by Margo St. James and Carol Queen at the Hookers Ball Brothello, where the three will pay homage to the raucous galas in San Francisco and New York where prostitutes and their fans could out themselves and celebrate the oldest profession.

Sprinkle recently spoke with SF Weekly about the Hookers Ball, Halloween, and other rituals.More >>