What's Up - Your guide to what's happening in Fayetteville, AR this week!
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of the night. They just have to see where the colorful light is coming from. By the time they get all the way to the balloon light sculpture, they might notice that the projections not only change color and pulsating patterns, but are able to make images of clouds in midair. Some might even lay flat on the ground to watch the digital clouds roll by in the night. But as a festivalgoer who wants to take in everything, you have a lot of stops to make. To get to Smokey's, a venue in a hidden forest enclave, you have to step through James Tapscott's work, a circular, eclipse-like installation called Arc Zero. From far away, you see the light element smudging visually. It's only when you walk under it that you realize the site-responsive work is misting the people that walk below it. Once inside the forest behind it, music lovers are thrown into a venue designed by assume astro vivid focus, an artist duo, one from Brazil, the other from France. The result is something they describe as an adult playground. The stage is neon colored and resembles a creature's face; artists on stage can be seen inside its big mouth. During performances, lights sometimes form a jagged line like teeth or shoot laser-like beams from its eyes. And you can't miss the shimmering disco ball glimmering at its center. Tracing your steps back through Arc Zero and past the hot air balloon you come to a small black box of a place. If you dare to pull back a black curtain and step inside a room as black-as- night, you'll see a spatial artwork by John Gerrard and Richie Hawtin. The digital simulation produces a video loop of an ouroboros, a snake eating its tail, historically symbolic of infinity or the cycle of life, death and rebirth. It's shown in combination with techno music to immerse audiences with the music and visual aspects. As you start to walk past the barn which once stood at The Momentary, you might get pulled in by local drag queen Maddy Morphosis, who hosted the venue renamed "Drag Me to the Disco" for FORMAT Festival. Inside the disco madhouse — aside from the neon green spotlights, disco balls lining the rafters and glitter curtains dividing small seating areas — was live salsa, funk and African disco performances, not to mention lots and lots of dancing. If you manage to break free, your next chance to dance is one stop down at Solana House, marked by a small forest of metallic cylinders (that stand taller than most people), where live DJ sets happen with digital video backgrounds. Come back during daylight hours and they offer you free snacks, like popsicles and tamales. Across the way is a three story building called The Cube. Long before you get inside, you can see people enjoying the 4-D sound and augmented sonic realities. The lights reveal the thin, translucent material of the structure's exterior, making the silhouettes from within a part of its look. After all the dancing and walking, DomeRx is a welcome stop for legs and minds that need a break. In Darren Romanelli's 360 Immersive Dome, festivalgoers choose a bean bag to lay back and watch projections not unlike a laser light show while listening to techno and other music. Once you've rested, you might have just enough time to poke your head into one of the holes in Pia Camil's large fiber artwork, which looks like a ton of T-shirts stitched together. Then it's back to the live music. The Flaming Lips — with Nick Cave's 10 feet tall raffia and hair Soundsuits interacting and dancing at the edge of the stage — Beach House and Rufus du Sol all played to packed audiences on the North of Oz and South of Oz stages late Saturday night into early Sunday morning. Update No date has been announced for a 2023 FORMAT Festival. January 1-7, 2023 What's up! 39 President Brent A. Powers editor Becca Martin-Brown 479-872-5054 bmartin@nwaonline.com twitter: nWAbecca rePorters Monica Hooper mhooper@nwaonline.com April Wallace awallace@nwaonline.com (479) 770-3746 designer Deb Harvell ! UP WHAT'S On The COVeR athena sinclair, 2021 Miss Gay arkansas america, performs for the crowd June 18, at the 2022 northwest arkansas pride Weekend in the Walton arts Center parking lot in Fayetteville. (NWA DemocrAt-GAzette/HANk LAytoN) What's Up! is a publication of the Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. FORMAT Continued From Page 5 Year-end ToP 10 To get to Smokey's, this venue that was in a hidden forest enclave, folks had to step through James tapscott's work, a circular, eclipse-like installation called arc Zero. the site-responsive work misted the people that walked below it. (nWa Democrat-Gazette File photo/april Wallace)