Boats float on an artistic vision

Alongside a swollen Hudson River, behind a dilapidated Lansingburgh mansion, a ragtag band of artists and builders this week is preparing for a most unusual voyage.

The center of everybody’s attention: four boats — Maria, Altheia, Alice and Lucille. On Friday, the boats will begin a three-week trip to New York City, but they are hardly typical pleasure craft.

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These boats carry a heavier burden.

They are works of art designed by Swoon, a well-regarded New York City artist. They also are stages for six upcoming music and theater performances, including a Friday night show in downtown Troy and one Saturday night at the Corning Preserve in Albany.

And, not least, they are ecological models, built of reclaimed garbage and powered by biofuels. At least one, Alice, will be propelled by a converted Mercedes-Benz engine scavenged from a wrecked car.

The three-week voyage is called “Swimming Cities of Switchback Sea.”

“It’s an art project,” said A’Yen Tran, who tends to serve as the project’s spokeswoman. “The point is to explore the river, give our performances and allow people to enjoy the fantastic design of these boats. It is kind of magical.”

A skeptic, though, might survey the wacky-looking boats and the seemingly chaotic scurrying of the hip 20- and 30-somethings and see the voyage as a quixotic dream.

Works of art are nice, after all, but boats need working engines. And they need to float.

Skeptics should know, though, that the trip wouldn’t be happening without months of detailed planning that includes securing permits and licenses. They should know, too, that many of the folks involved with Switchback took a similar — but much longer — trip down the Mississippi River in 2006.

That journey, “Miss Rockaway Armada,” received national press and art-world attention, even inspiring a exhibit now showing at Mass MoCA, the art museum in North Adams, Mass.

And the project’s participants are not short on credentials.

Swoon has had her work shown in the Museum of Modern Art in New York City and the Brooklyn Museum of Art. The project’s playwright is Lisa D’Amour, who won an Obie Award in 2003. And several of the boat builders are associated with Kinetic Steam Works, a San Francisco collaborative of industrial artists.

Swoon and Dietch Studios, a New York City arts organization, are funding Switchback.

Switchback won’t be for everybody. Not everyone will find the boats beautiful. The play will stray from conventional storytelling. And the music, mostly from the band Dark Dark Dark, won’t make it onto your local playing-the-hits radio station.

Tran conceded she wasn’t sure what Capital Region audiences would make of the show.

But on a recent morning, any worries about the performances were outmaneuvered by worries about the boats, which were built in New York City then disassembled and trucked to Troy. The weather — steadily rainy — hasn’t been conducive to easy completion of last-minute preparations.

But if all goes as planned, the Troy and Albany performances will be followed by shows in Saugerties, Kingston and Croton-on-Hudson.

And if all goes as planned, a reception for Switchback — a celebration of the trip’s completion — will be held Sept. 7 in Long Island City.

By Chris Churchill

Times Union