Namesake; The Story of a Name
by Joshua Sofaer
a live performance with soundscape in collaboration with composer
Jonathan
Cooper

* 13 May @ 7.30pm, The Jewish Museum, 129-131 Albert Street, London
NW1, box
office 0207 284 1997
* 14 May @ 8pm, home, 1a Flodden Rd, SE5 9LL booking line 07957 565336
or
book online www.Lgihome.co.uk
* 15 May @ 7.30pm, The Swiss Church, 79 Endell St, London WC2H, box
office
0207 836 1418

namesake is a rich multi-layered audio piece which tracks the journey
of an
artist – Joshua Sofaer – to discover the roots and reverberations of
his name.

The journey takes him from London to New York where he meets his
namesake,
the other Joshua Sofaer, a full-time proselytising missionary for Jews
for Jesus
, a breakaway Messianic group who believe in the salvation of Jesus but
choose
to maintain their Jewish heritage. The Joshua Sofaers discuss what it
has
been like to live with this name, their lives, religion and politics.
They are
both Joshua Sofaer – very different but also exactly the same.

Together they trace what they can of their collective heritage (they
share a
great-great-grandfather) in mid-Nineteenth Century Bagdad, and how they
understand the Hebrew reverberations of their name – Joshua/Salvation –
Sofaer/Scribe.

The journey also meets with chance encounters on the streets of New
York. A
young Hassidic yeshiva student offers his view on Jews for Jesus and
retells
stores passed on from Rabbi to Rabbi about the role of the Scribe (the
Sofaer)
in Jewish life. "How can Jewish people exist without a Sofaer, we’re
hopeless
without a Sofaer," he says.

The New York trip ends with a trip to a practising Scribe in the Lower
East
Side of Manhattan.

Part documentary, part autobiography, namesake meets with absurdity and
chance encounter, where understanding and belief revolve round the
arbitrary act of
naming.

  Joshua Sofaer is a live artist, writer, educator and Co-Director of
Spread
the Word, Literature Development Agency in London. He makes work in a
variety
of contexts which include traditional art spaces, alternative galleries
and
nightclubs; both nationally and internationally. In June 2002 he
presents ‘The
Crystal Ball’ at the ICA in London, an interactive weekend event which
predicts
the lives of the audience members that attend. He is also working on a
number
of written documents which consider the possibilities of writing as
performance, under the imprint ‘Outsmart’.

His research into ‘autography’, which he is pursuing at Dartington
College,
seeks to make readings of contemporary culture through a notion of the
‘performative portrait’. Recent publications include ‘Disinter/est:
Digging Up Our
Childhood’ in On Editing – Performance Research Volume 7, No.1, March
2002.

Joshua is currently recipient of a One to One bursary from the Live Art
Development Agency and London Arts.

For more information or images please contact home, Tel. 0207 274 3452,
07957
565336