Liminal Archive

Photos by Erik McGregor

Liminal Archive is an immersive theatrical experience that guides audiences through intimate moments of isolation experienced by artists as they traverse the unknown during the early days of the pandemic. Liminal Archive began as an open-source platform, providing a cultural exchange where international artists could collaborate together during a lockdown and mass uprisings, and it has collected more than 40 artworks, including music, digital art and theater. Al Límite has curated these offerings into a 40-minute odyssey of live performances, projections and audio journeys where we venture through the past, the present, and find our way together into the future.

Review from New York Magazine

“The secret to this kind of fluid, seemingly borderless work is actually hidden discipline. The Liminal Archive is the sort of scrappy underground production that depends heavily on Christmas lights and the theatergoers’ goodwill, but despite (or because of) its material poverty, it takes scrupulous care of the audience. The producing directors Leah Bachar, Dennis Yueh-Yeh Li, and Monica Dudárov Hunken have agreed on a structure that moves the watchers around swiftly and confidently; every section of this crazy-quilt performance is brief enough to intrigue us but long enough to develop a thought. It displays the dramaturgy necessary to light-touch work, an attunement to how much an audience can sustain its attention in the absence of the usual interest-generators like plot. And despite the many folks involved, there’s a shared, modest intention behind the whole thing. This restraint registers as a kind of ragged elegance. In two places during the show, we hear a text by Ireri Romero: “I close my eyes and suddenly I feel a network of invisible threads that cover my entire body.” The collective makes us feel this sense of connectivity, first by demonstrating their own decentralized artistic partnership, then by sewing us — with six quick stitches — into their tapestry.”