Experience this shared evening as part of Prelude 2026:

BUONG BUO BINAGO!
by Kenneth Keng:

ABOUT THE PERFORMANCE

“Buong-buo,” very roughly translated from Tagalog, means total completeness or wholeness, both in community and within one's soul. Ever changing, the piece began as an audience-participative dance tutorial and colonial history lesson. In this latest iteration, titled Buong Buo Binago!, Lead Deviser Kenneth Keng asks how creative renewal is possible in the face of cultural annihilation.

CREDITS
The Buong Buo Collective contains within it the souls of Kenneth Keng, Carlos Lising, Red Concepcion, Misha Bernas and Danilo Zepeda.

ABOUT THE ARTIST(S)

Kenneth Keng (kennethkeng.com) is a New York-based Filipino-Chinese playwright and performer who makes work about falling in love with a culture devouring his own.
Selected honors include: 2026 Artist-in-Residence at the North American Cultural Laboratory, 2026 New York State Council on the Arts/NYSCA Grantee, 2025/26 Artist-in-Residence at the cell theatre NYC, 2025 Princess Grace Fellowship (Semifinalist), 2024 Carlos Palanca Memorial Award for Literature, 2024 The Civilians/Princeton Next Forever Initiative (Finalist), 2023/24 Artist-in-Residence at the University Settlement/Performance Project. In NYC, Kenneth's work has been selected for staging at the cell, Target Margin, A.R.T. Mezzanine, Brick, Ars Nova, JACK, Life World, Chain, Tank, Maker's Space and Speyer Hall theatres.

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BACCHANALIA
by Gianfranco Reyes

ABOUT THE PERFORMANCE
Bacchanalia is a raucous performance that collides military ceremony with spectacle and excess. Moving between monologue, musical numbers, karaoke and dance, Bacchanalia transforms the language and gestures of military authority into an unruly theatrical celebration. The performance plays with the tension between discipline and indulgence, command and flirtation, patriotism and absurdity. Through exaggerated gestures, seductive theatrics, and playful audience interaction, the military persona gradually unravels into a figure of camp simulacra. Part cabaret, part ceremony, and part public disturbance, Bacchanalia invites the audience into a world where authority and the military uniform become a costume for excess and release.

ABOUT THE ARTIST(S)

Gianfranco Reyes is a Peruvian-born, New York-based transdisciplinary performance artist. Through a recurring U.S. military persona, his practice uses camp, theatrical sensibilities and the streets to examine authority, citizenship and public space. His site-responsive performances often take place unannounced in streets, parks, plazas, and other communal spaces throughout New York City. Reyes received a BFA from The Cooper Union and is an MFA candidate at Columbia University. He is a recipient of the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation Fellowship, The Provost Fund Grant, The Carroll and Milton Petrie Foundation Grant, The Lucas T. Carlson Grant and more. He has presented work in solo performances and group exhibitions at LACMA, Coaxial Arts Foundation, The Latinx Project, Wallach Gallery, ArtCake and ZAZ10TS Times Square.