OutLOUD, a Staten Island group that organizes public reading of literature received a NEA Big Read grant to produce a series of the "Stories and Poems of Edgar Allen Poe". They asked Day de Dada performance art collective to produce one of the events and it occurred Sunday Sept. 29, 2013 at the Unitarian Church of Staten Island in conjunction with the church's Arts Committee programming.
The event began with the audience entering through the garden gate greeted by Day de Dada artists who read poems, invited them to wear raven wings and create their own mad lib version with sections of the Poe poem "The Raven". A group of Butoh dancers then entered the garden and executed an extremely slow, meditative walk along the path that encircles the memorial garden. Eventually the dancers made their way into the church parish hall and the audience was invited to join them, which many did. A version of another Poe poem "Dreamland" was read at that point and the group then moved into the church sanctuary where "the Raven" poem was recited completely, with the audience invited to say the Nevermore raven lines.
