in conversation_Nile Harris x Alex Tatarsky

17JUNE2025 "Talk Back," a scripted artist talk performed by

NILE

and Alex Tatarsky, written by Peter BD, and underscored by Shane Riley. This conversation was part of Cold Reading: Nile Harris x Alex Tatarsky, featured in 99 Canal's annual 5x5 performance series. Below is a written response to the event by Giorgia Alliata.

AI’s take on the full recording of the night

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In response_Giorgia Alliata:

Speakers:

Nile Harris is a performer and director of live works of art. He has done a few things and hopes to do a few more, God willing.

Alex Tatarsky (they/them; born 1989 in New York, NY; lives and works in New York, NY, and Philadelphia, PA) makes live performances in the unfortunate in-between zone of dance, theater, performance art, and comedy—drawing on traditions from vaudeville to futurist poetry. Their practice embraces the figure of the bouffon, a European clown type said to live in the swamps at the edge of the kingdom, who was not only allowed to mock the king’s power but rewarded for it. Tatarsky’s original solo pieces have been presented at a wide array of venues including La MaMa, MoMA PS1, The Kitchen, Judson Memorial Church, Playwrights Horizons, and Abrons Arts Center, as well as comedy clubs, bars, basements, and trash heaps. As curatorial fellow at the Poetry Project, they organized a series on the poetics and politics of rot. Along with collaborator Ming Lin, they form one half of Shanzhai Lyric and its fictional office Canal Street Research Association. Tatarsky experienced fleeting fame as Andy Kaufman’s daughter and used to perform as a mound of dirt.

TRANSCRIPT
recorded on 06.06.2025

AT: The “Talk Back” by Peter BD.

NH: Nile Harris as Nile.

AT: Alex Tatarsky as Alex.

AT: Um, Balda, where's our water? In our rider, we were supposed to have sparkling waters with lemon?