May 9th is the final day of our campaign.
Help us reach our Stretch Goal of $8,500 by 2am tonight!
April 24 Update: Success! & Our New Goal
Thanks to all our generous contributors we have just surpassed our original goal of $6,000!
Thank you so much to everyone who has supported the campaign to date! Your participation has made John's album project a reality.
Because of the great momentum and level of interest, we’re
extending the campaign by 10 days to May 10th and increasing our fundraising goal to $8,500.
The reason for this new ‘stretch goal’ of $8,500 is simple
and clear - raising this additional $2,500 will assist John in completing work
on ‘Escape Artist Redux’, a 4-channel video installation project that contains
8 of the songs from the album ‘Beauty Kills Me’. This hour-long video piece is about 90%
complete, and this additional funding will support the final editing and
mastering process before this important opus can be exhibited in museums and
galleries.
Help us reach our New Goal of $8,500 by making a contribution or ordering the CD or music download today.
Short Summary
Thank you for visiting my campaign page. My name is John
Kelly, performance artist and singer. I’ve been showing my
original performance works in theaters, concert halls and clubs around the world for more than 30 years. But until now, I’ve
never released a full-length album. That is about to change with the upcoming
release of Beauty Kills Me.
I’m inviting you to join us in raising the funds to complete and release my debut album.
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Beauty Kills Me is a labor of love that I’ve been
working on for more than three years. Most of the songs were
written for my performance work, The Escape Artist, developed at
the Sundance Theatre Institute, and premiered at Performance Space 122 through the Ethyl Eichelberger Award. The brilliant
singer-songwriter Carol Lipnik wrote the music for seven of the songs (and sings on the album.) I’m the lyricist for these, and for 2 other songs I also composed. You can listen (and watch!) song samples on the Gallery tab of our campaign page.
What We Need & What You Get
The music for the album has already been
arranged, recorded and mixed, but we need to raise an additional $6,000 to cover the
mastering, graphics, production and minor promotional costs.
We’re asking you to contribute to our Indiegogo campaign to help us through the final stretch of this important project.
To show our appreciation for
your support, we’ve created a range of great perks and thank you gifts,
including music downloads, signed CDs, limited edition art and VIP tickets to
my May 3rd album release event at Joe’s Pub in NYC. Check out the
list of perks to the right and look below for images of the artworks being offered as thank you gifts.
By making a contribution or buying the
download or CD you can help make this project a reality. Contributions of any
amount will move us closer to our goal.
The Impact
This is really a benchmark project for me, not just because it’s autobiographical, but because it will live on as a tangible reality beyond any of my live performances. True to my reputation, I sing in at least 3 vocal octaves, and in a variety of vocal styles, so this is a true showcase of my work and its creative reach. I'm very proud of this recording, and your support will have a profound effect on my capacity to share it with a much larger audience.
The Budget
We’ve
already completed and paid for project development, artist fees, studio sessions,
mixing, promotional video & photography.
What your contributions will help cover:
- Additional mastering: $1,500
- Graphic design & printing: $1,000
- CD manufacturing: $2,000
- Marketing & promotions: $1,500
- Total Fundraising Goal: $6,000
Other Ways You Can Help
You can help us reach our ambitious goal by sharing the news of this campaign and album with your friends - via Facebook, email, word of mouth, and the Indiegogo share tools. Thank you for spreading the word!
You can buy tickets to the May 3rd Joe’s Pub concert here, and sign up for the John Kelly Performance newsletter here.
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Risks & Challenges
Raising funds
for experimental work is never easy, but we're committed to
completing this album by early May. If we don’t reach our fundraising goal we'll cut back on some of our planned promotions - and if we exceed our goal, we'll use the additional funds to complete the editing of the four-channel film version of 'Escape Artist Redux', a project that uses music from the album as its soundtrack.
Artwork Perks
Music download and CD perks start at $12 and $25. Details of artwork perks are below.
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For $50 you can get a signed John Kelly/Joni Mitchell Paper Doll (8½" x 11" sheet, printed on archival stock); the CD and digital download.
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For $50 you can get a signed copy of Schiele-Kelly (2010, paperback, full color, 6" x 9", 40 pages) a comprehensive catalogue of art work created by John Kelly inspired by the life and art of Egon Schiele; plus the signed CD and digital download.
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For $100 you get a signed, limited edition John Kelly
photograph Self Portrait as Egon Schiele (archival digital print, 6" x 7”, edition of 80); the
CD and digital download.
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For $350 you get a signed, limited edition John Kelly print
Fuck Pain and Heroics (archival digital print, 5.5" x 11”, edition of 50); the CD and digital download. This image is part of a new graphic novel based on 'The Escape Artist'.
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For $600 you get a signed original drawing by John Kelly
from his Screaming Heads series (graphite on paper, 9” x 11”, unique); the CD and digital
download. (images will vary)
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For $5000 you get a private concert of John Kelly’s legendary interpretation of the music of Joni Mitchell. The 50-minute concert will include 'Joni' and her accompanist 'Georgia O’Keefe.' This perk includes membership the JKP Producers Circle for one year, two VIP tickets to the album release event at Joe’s Pub on May 3, plus 10 signed CDs and a digital download. *Travel & accommodation (if needed) and piano or keyboard to be provided by donor.
Tax-Deductible Contributions
John Kelly Performance is a sponsored project of Fractured
Atlas, a non-profit arts service organization. Contributions for the charitable
purposes of John Kelly Performance must be made payable to 'Fractured Atlas' only.
Any contribution above the value of the goods and services received by
the donor is tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law.
Thank you for your support! Select your contribution level and perk from the right side
of this page.
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John Kelly is a performance and visual artist. His performance works range in scale
from solo to larger ensemble, and stem from autobiographical, cultural, and
political issues. Subjects have
included the Berlin Wall, the Troubadours, the AIDS epidemic, Mythology, Expressionistic
Film, and character studies based on Egon Schiele, Caravaggio, Antonin Artaud,
Joni Mitchell, and Jean Cocteau, as well as other character studies based on
the nature of creative genius.
These works have been performed at The Kitchen, Lincoln Center, the Warhol
Museum, the Whitney Museum, PS 122, BAM’s Next Wave Festival, La MaMa, and London’s Tate
Modern, among other venues.
Over the course of his four-decade-long career he has
created over 30 group and solo performance works, including such benchmark
works as ‘Pass The Blutwurst, Bitte’ (1986) and ‘Find My Way Home' (1988), both
of which received NEA American Masterpieces Dance Awards (for their 2010 &
2011 reconstructions). More recent
works include ‘Escape Artist Redux’ at Bard Live Arts in 2014, and ‘Love of a
Poet’ at LMCC's River to River Festival in 2015.
Other awards include: 2 Bessie Awards; 2 Obie Awards; a
CalArts Alpert Award; a Visual AIDS Vanguard Award; and the Ethyl Eichelberger
Award. Fellowships include: The
American Academy in Rome; The Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard;
The Guggenheim Foundation; The Sundance Theatre Institute; Art Matters, Inc.;
and a 2013 USA Artists Fellowship. He was recently an Armory Artist in Residence
at the Park Avenue Armory, and a Visiting Artist in Residence a Bard College.
As a singer he has collaborated and recorded with composers David Del Tredici, Richard Einhorn, Laurie Anderson, and The Jazz Passengers. His visual art has been exhibited at
Alexander Gray Associates, NY; MoMA; the List Visual Arts Center at MIT; ICA,
Philadelphia; The New Museum; PS 1; and Art In General among other venues. More info: johnkellyperformance.org
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Carol Lipnik -
the spellbinding, darkly-humorous singer and songwriter recently called
an "ethereal vocal phenomenon" by The New York Times is the artist in
residence at the East Village Boîte Pangea (performing every Sunday
since Jan 2015). She just completed a three week run at Joe's Pub in
March and is the the winner of the 2015 BroadWay World New York Cabaret
Award for best Alternative Cabaret Show. Her acclaimed new CD "Almost
Back To Normal" was funded by a grant from the Peter S. Reed
Foundation. She has collaborated with and composed music for performance
artist John Kelly's work “The Escape Artist,” and was recently an
artist in residence at the Yaddo Art Colony in Saratoga Springs, NY. More info: carollipnik.com
Video: John Kelly
Photo credits: Paula Court, Austin Young, Kevin Yatarola, Josef Astor, Dargelos, Albie Mitchell.
Thanks: Joe’s Pub at the Public Theater, Pangea, The Sundance Theater Institute, Music-Theatre Group, Carol Lipnik, and Foster Reed.
