Bringing indie rock to its waterfront stage for the very first time, FringeArts announces an exciting addition to its spring 2014 calendar: the documentary film The Love Song of R. Buckminster Fuller, directed and live-narrated by Academy Award-nominated director Sam Green; and accompanied by a score performed live on stage by legendary Hoboken band Yo La Tengo. FringeArts will host two showings of the The Love Song of R. Buckminster Fuller on First Friday, April 4, at 7 and 9 p.m. A special member pre-sale will begin on Feb. 27, and general tickets will be on sale March 1 at fringearts.com or by calling 215-413-1318.. The Love Song of R. Buckminster Fuller traces the career of the titular 20th-century futurist, architect, engineer, author and inventor of the geodesic dome. An early proponent of environmental stewardship, Fuller (1895-1983) spoke persuasively about contemporary design and architecture’s ability to tackle issues of sustainability and conservation, and to stimulate radical societal change. Fuller lived in Philadelphia from 1972 until his death in 1983, teaching at the University of Pennsylvania, Bryn Mawr College, Haverford College and Swarthmore College. At each screening, Green — best known for his 2004 Oscar-nominated documentary The Weather Underground — will narrate the film in person, cuing images from a laptop while Yo La Tengo performs the film’s original score. A follow-up to Green’s internationally acclaimed live film Utopia in Four Movements, The Love Song of R. Buckminster Fuller features the same lively combination of film clips and live music, as Green’s in-person cinematic narration draws inspiration equally from old travelogues, TED talks and the Benshi Japanese performance tradition. The New York Times called the film “a singular experience, and a collective one, with the potential for human connection and human error.” MORE
RELATED: In 1927 designer, architect, and inventor R. Buckminster Fuller was contemplating suicide on the shore of Lake Michigan, when he had an epiphany:
“The thought then came that my impulse to commit suicide was a consequence of my being expressly overconcerned with ‘me’ and ‘my pains,’ and that doing so would mean that I would be making the supremely selfish mistake of possibly losing forever some evolutionary information link essential to the ultimately realization of the as-yet-to-be-known human function in Universe.”
According to legend, Fuller decided to “throw away” his “personal ego” instead of committing suicide, and use himself “as a scientific `guinea pig’… on behalf of all humanity.” He resolved to “make the world work for one hundred percent of humanity, in the shortest possible time, through spontaneous cooperation, without ecological offense or the disadvantage of anyone.” At least that is the story as Fuller told it. MORE