Theater-On-The-Walk™ Sun God, Tripod, What A Squad!

News Source: The Dartmouth (College Newspaper)
Headline: "Sun God, Tripod, What A Squad"
Publisher: Sarah Irving (Dartmouth Staff)
Publication Date: January 22nd, 2010

Theater-On-The-Walk™ Information Update

Defined: Officially launched July 4th, 2009 "Theater-On-The-Walk™" exploded onto the scene as a unique and inspiring traveling performing arts anthology consisting of live theatrical events and an extensive on-line searchable historical collection of event photographs, video footage, news articles, and audio files. Theater-On-The-Walk™ provides the venue for individual and group expression of life’s emotional struggles as viewed through the context of love, anger, joy, and sorrow.

Origins: Theater-On-The-Walk™ is a depiction of my emotional life experiences in search of wanting to belong, to enjoy friendship, and to find love. My humanity has been transformed through a series of stressful events, none of which were entirely within my realm of control, e.g. not having a circle of close friends, rejection and humiliation in relationships, confrontations with authority, having to choose between love or attending a university, and struggling with life itself – thoughts of loneliness, remorsefulness, anger, sorrow, and even suicide. The final catalyst to the formation of Theater-On-The-Walk™ occurred during the summer of 2009 when I was forced to withdraw from another University because I fell in love with one of my college professors. The circumstances surrounding the entire event were so surreal, so out of context, and emotionally painful that I was forced to question life itself – who am I? What is life and what does it mean? What can I do to make the world a better place? What is love and why does it bring such tragedy?

Purpose: Theater-On-The-Walk™ is more than just a performance - it is the platform I use to display my humanity and all of life’s vulnerabilities that follow suit. I want everyone, from all walks of life, to understand the importance of acknowledging the love that every individual carries deep within themselves and the love that every living creature posses from within. Being able to share this compassion amongst all of you will hopefully lay the basic elemental foundation needed to help and improve our humanity, our society, and our world.

The Stage: Theater-On-The-Walk™ is like a walking Shakespearian play that sets the world of mankind on a stage to a theatrical story narrated in real time through the life of my inner identity, known as “The Sun God” – a name created by my audience. Birthed from my heartbreak with women, The Sun God is the physical manifestation of my inner beauty as a human being in search of love. Despite this bold approach, I am beset by sadness, for underlying my ongoing quest to discover love, is the tragedy of the mask I wear. Like a romantic dilemma direct from one of Walt Disney’s fairy tales the question arises - will the woman of my dreams ever be able to perceive the man behind the mask and come to my rescue with true love’s kiss? - A riddle solved through heart’s eyes.

Theater-On-The-Walk™ Recognition

Theater-On-The-Walk™ has now become a recognized group by the student body of Dartmouth College. In addition to this, the departments of Public Safety and local Hanover police have also accepted my presence as a public performer. This acknowledgment had been an uphill battle since I first began in early September of 2009 and has taken a tremendous amount of time, patience, and effort to achieve.

When I first began my project many students were confused by what I was doing and some were even frightened by my presence in costume. As a result, I had to launch a massive advertising campaign necessary to inform the student body and citizens of downtown Hanover of my project. I circulated the school’s bulletin boards with dozens of artistic flyers and also created a large movie poster - placed in the central kiosk of campus. While this was taking place I also made a special effort to show up in costume during popular campus-wide events. I attended football games, went on hiking raids, joined the street march of the 2009 Bonfire parade, and even attended the inauguration of Dartmouth’s new President Jim Yong Kim. By this time my presence had become well known throughout the town but newspaper critiques of the Dartmouth Press were hard pressed to think so.

I soon found myself being mocked in a series of comics from the school newspaper. The slanderous narration and crude drawings seemed to focus heavily on articulating the author’s personal dislike of my presence on campus. Online articles from “The Little Green Blog” rapidly published their own set speculative insult. The author of these insensitive blog articles labeled me with a variety of names and judgmental remarks referring to me as a “loner”, a “drifter”, and even a “creepy groper”. In addition to this, I began to take notice to the increasingly unusual pursuit of Public Safety security vehicles who relentlessly followed and watched me everywhere I went. The combination of all these reactions made for an unpleasant atmosphere both for me and the students who were genuinely curious to learn more about Theater-On-The-Walk™. Despite all the negative karma, I knew in my heart I was doing the right thing so I refused to give up.

My persistence remained firm and eventually I was given an interview opportunity to explain the details concerning my project. The published content of the article, entitled “The Sun God Also Rises”, primarily concerned itself with the reactions from my appearance in costume at President Kim’s inauguration. In his address to the student body Kim stated that,

“Your generation must dream, dream more ambitiously than any who have preceded you. But just to dream is not enough. You must deliver on the dream where previous generations have fallen short...The passion I want you to find takes work. It represents less an emotional sensation than an intellectual achievement. You won’t find it by sitting passively in the classroom or surfing the web. You have to work hard at finding something you can tackle with passion for a big chunk of your life and find meaning in it. That’s an active and an urgent task. You need to start it now...Each one of you has the ability to achieve great things. But beyond a certain level of talent, the difference between those who achieve great things and those who don’t is usually not talent, it’s persistence.”

Kim’s speech validated my attendance because I truly felt as if I was the living personification of his words. In addition being able to articulate my passionate mission, the publication of the article inadvertently created the official name for my character now known by my audience as “The Sun God”.

Theater-On-The-Walk™ The Sun God, Keggy, Swine, and... Football?

News Source: The Little Green Blog
Headline: "The Sun God, Keggy, Swine, and... Football?”
Publisher: Laura J. Neill
Publication Date: November 9th, 2009

Theater-On-The-Walk™ Introduction

Introduction: As of July 4th 2009, a performance art activity for Project R.E.C.O.R, entitled "Theater-On-The-Walk™" has officially started. This project is created, directed, and performed exclusively by me. This personal venture of mine has taken several years of methodical planning, preparation, and financial obligation. The contextual layout of these performing art activities originates from my life experiences as a developing human being in search of love. More specifically, Theater-On-The-Walk™ is a theatrical play that artistically illustrates the emotional spectrum of my heartbreak with women. The range of these emotions takes the form of a variety of fictional characters that are used to embody and personify the feelings of joy, sorrow, and anger. The first two emotions are expressed through dance while the latter is expressed primarily through role-played acting and choreographed martial arts sequences.

Mission: These impromptu performances are intended for people who recognize that life isn't as serious as we sometimes make it out to be. As such, our mission as a collective student body is to have fun and let loose the emotional energies and stresses of our lives to form a meaningful and creative performance that builds from the foundation of our humanity.

General Goal: In addition to being able to express myself as an artist, it is my sincere hope this project will help bring about and unite individuals who share similar life passions by actively seeking to embracing who you are as a human being without fear, expressing loving compassion to each other without judgment, and staying true to the wisdom of your heart at all times.

Aspiring Goal: Pursuing this project as a creative outlet has been a difficult journey, not only in conception and craft but more specifically for my decision to actively unlock and express the vulnerabilities of my heart and soul for all to see, hear, and judge. Theater-On-The-Walk™ is more than just a performance; it is the display of my humanity and all the vulnerabilities that follow suit. If there ever was a true goal or purpose to this performance it is that I want to make aware, for all people, of every society in the world, to understand the importance of acknowledging the love that every individual carries deep within themselves; the love that every living creature posses from within, and from this, being able to share this compassion among all you come across to help improve the conditions of our society, world, and humanity.

Motivation: To find the love of my life.

Theater-On-The-Walk™ Unmasking The Sun God

News Source: Dartmouth Free Press (DFP)
Cover Headline: "Johnathan Recor - His Life, His Mission"
Publisher(s): Michelle Evans & Christine Averill (Dartmouth 13')
Publication Date: October 12th, 2009

Theater-On-The-Walk™ The Sun God Also Rises

News Source: The Dartmouth (College Newspaper)
Headline: "The Sun God Also Rises"
Publisher: Kevin Niparko (Dartmouth 12')
Publication Date: October 1st, 2009