TSL "Room/Raum" Was A Performance, A Book, And Now A Movie
"Room/Raum" is the movie of a book of an opera of a performance of raw text from 40 years ago, at Time and Space Limited.
Art is life at Time and Space Limited in Hudson. The earnest expression of boundary-dismantling creativity is not just the stock and trade of the 30-year-old theater and gallery institution on Columbia Street, it is the physical expression of the shared life of TSL’s directors Linda Mussmann and Claudia Bruce.
Their latest project, “Room/Raum,” a movie version of a piece Mussmann first wrote over 40 years ago, will be screened and discussed on October 21 to kick off TSL’s archive project. While they are digitizing and preserving Mussmann’s notes, writings, sketches and miles of old eight-millimeter reel-to-reels, they stress they aren’t making a museum to themselves but rather inviting a new generation to join in conversation with work they haven’t been able to share with the public for decades.
The movie “Room/Raum,” is an animation of the text and gestural drawings of the self-published book, which cryptically depicts the script and stage directions of a spoken opera performed simultaneously in English and German — an adaptation itself of the original performance from 1977, written by Mussmann and performed by Bruce in their old shoebox storefront on West 22nd Street in Manhattan – back in the very beginning of their collaboration. Confused? That’s okay. It’s part of the process. It’s part of the fun.
Claudia Bruce and Linda Mussmann at TSL
“For me, '77-'78 was really a departure from the narrative,” Mussmann said. “I wanted to go into a more poetic, more pure place. I wanted to create a work that wasn’t driven by narrative or character, so I did this concept of using text as sound, text as gesture, in a space that created another way of seeing theater. So it was pretty radical stuff.”
Mussmann and Bruce said now, with the opportunity and equipment to build the archive and look back on their old work, it still feels very fresh. They hope their dedicated audience, and new faces from the ever-evolving city of Hudson, will enjoy the look back in new ways, with the additional context of time.
“This work still resonates with me,” said Mussmann. “Henry Munson, the archivist here, he’s 23, and for him the work feels very much alive and the work really speaks to him. The work seems very vital and important.”
Using remastered audio of early performances and visuals from the book, Munson has crafted a new evolution of “Room/Raum.” Over 40 years, Mussman’s initial script was translated into movement, which was then broken back down into text. Now, it is the text itself that moves across the movie screen.
Still confused? Mussmann doesn’t mind. She’s been giving the same advice to the befuddled for years: “Just let it go,” she said. “Just give up right away. Because by the time you struggle with me, you miss so much. You will enter at some point, whether you like it or not. Something is going to break through, unless you try to totally block it out. But if you come in and you are ready, I think it will help you enter the piece.”
Mussmann said kids always get her work because they exist in the moment. Their expectations haven’t been “monkeyed with” yet so they’re more present. This reporter showed the trailer for “Room/Raum” to a local seven-year-old, who immediately demanded to see more. Her review: “I like it! It hypnotized me.”
“When you walk in to a theater and look at a screen you’ve already assumed a certain amount of information,” Mussman said. “Walking into TSL always creates a tremendous amount of confusion and disorientation. There’s always some sort of shenanigan to disorient you immediately and that’s always what I’m after — confuse you so you can see something.”
Hypnotic disorientation is not the experience most expect from a night at the movies, and that’s exactly what makes TSL so special. They are always going to startle your senses with something new even if it’s from 40 years ago.
Mussmann and Bruce have slogged through the past year and a half of running a gathering space during Covid and emerged in the full glory of their mastery of the avant guarde. With all due safety precautions (including requiring proof of vaccination), they are showing movies again, and the gallery is full of the arresting work of Jacob Fossum and his exhibition, "Idle Worship." They also opened a surprisingly popular, well-curated used bookstore and their kitchen is now home to Atelier Ku-Ki, crafting delicious and beautiful bento boxes and omusubi which are perfect for weekend takeout.
In a time when entertainment is so predictable and available, “Room/Raum,” TSL, the archive, Mussmann, and Bruce, exist in their own unique little continuum outside popular expectation. A community has been created here, a collection of artists and audiences, seeking something visceral. If you’re interested, you can find the perfect introduction to what TSL is Thursday October 21 at 6 p.m. Tickets are $40 to support the archive project. The event includes the screening, a Q&A, as well as food and drinks. Visit timeandspace.org for tickets and more information.
