UP CLOSE

With performance artist MEREDITH MONK, who commences her twentieth season with the American premiere of The Games, which opens the Brooklyn Academy of Music's Next Wave Festival on October 9.

On The Games: "It was commissioned by the Schaubuhne [theater company], Berlin, and premiered there last November. I first worked with them in 1980 on my production of Vessel, an epic pageant with 150 extras, twenty-seven motorcyclists, a Volkswagen bus, and a welder. The Games is more intimate, a sciencefiction ritual with six main characters, a chorus of singer-mover-instrumentalists, and conceptual slides and visuals."

On labels: "People think of me as a dancer, but I've been doing multimedia pieces since 1966. I feel like I have to keep defining myself, but I've made my statement and I've been very consistent about it. The main thrust of my work is to do performance pieces which eliminate defined categories."

On work: "I'm interested in working with people who come from different backgrounds—music, painting, acting, even science—but who have a philosophy that has the same base as mine. The ideal is best seen in Oriental theater, where a performer moves easily from singing an aria to doing a movement to playing a dramatic scene."

On her twentieth season: "You can either forget it or go with it, so I thought I would just enjoy it."