Laurie Anderson has created a three-minute version of HEART OF A DOG that will be shown every night in January in Times Square — along with a special concert performance for dogs on January 4
Duffy Square, Times Square
Broadway between 46th & 47th Sts.
Monday, January 4, free, 11:00 pm
www.timessquarenyc.org
www.laurieanderson.com
Multidisciplinary performance artist Laurie Anderson has created a special three-minute version of her latest film, the poetic and deeply personal Heart of a Dog, that will be shown every evening from 11:57 pm to 12 midnight on fifteen signs throughout Times Square as part of the monthly Midnight Moment program, which turns the Crossroads of the World into an enormous digital art gallery courtesy of the Times Square Advertising Coalition and Times Square Arts. Her first full-length film since 1986’s Home of the Brave, Heart of a Dog, which is about the death of her beloved rat terrier, Lolabelle, and the loss of her husband, Lou Reed, has been shortlisted for the Best Documentary Feature Oscar; for Midnight Moment, Anderson has edited it down to a visual collage from a section about consciousness and The Tibetan Book of the Dead. “I love Times Square. It’s a dream,” Anderson said in a statement. “Desire, speed, the explosions of color, patterns and energy. What a great way to start the New Year! The ball drops and Heart of a Dog leaps onto all those massive screens at three minutes to midnight. Who could have predicted the unraveling dreams of my dog would be magnified up there like this? And sound too!” On January 4, Anderson will present the free, one-time-only “Midnight Moment Concert for Dogs,” a performance being held in honor of 9/11 first-responder canines; from 11:00 to 11:15 pm in Duffy Square, silent-disco headphones will be distributed to the public on a first-come, first-served basis. The audience will include dogs from the NYPD, MTA, and other city agencies, along with their handlers; the public is encouraged to bring their dogs as well. At 11:30, the concert will begin, broadcast through the headphones in addition to low-decibel speakers for the dogs. At 11:57, the three-minute version of Heart of a Dog will be shown, just as it will be every night in January. It should be another fascinating work from Anderson, who continues to test the boundaries of art, music, and film time and time again.