NEW YORK, NY.- The Museum of Modern Art has commissioned the New York –based artist collective Grand Openings to compose a multifaceted, live program of performances to take place in The Donald B. and Catherine C. Marron Atrium and in other locations throughout the Museum from July 20 through August 1, 2011. Over the course of the 13-day exhibition, the group’s five core members —Ei Arakawa, Jutta Koether, Jay Sanders, Emily Sundblad, and Stefan Tcherepnin—will perform partly scripted and partly improvised actions, loose choreographies, musical scores, and acts of self-reflection, and will invite the collaboration of musicians, performance art scholars, sound artists, filmmakers, writers, and friends.

The title of the program, Grand Openings Return of the Blogs, refers to an additional documentary element of the work—a daily account of the actions in the form of handwritten texts, fabricated objects, and audio podcasts, which will be presented in the gallery space and on MoMA.org. As part of the Museum’s Performance Program, Grand Openings Return of the Blogs is organized by Sabine Breitwieser, Chief Curator, and Jenny Schlenzka, Assistant Curator for Performance, Department of Media and Performance Art, The Museum of Modern Art.

Performances will relate to the history of performance art in general, as well as MoMA’s particular institutional structure. Some pieces are informed by encounters with the Museum Archives, current exhibitions, the Museum’s architecture, and staff members; others are indirect meditations on the practice of performing itself.

The five members of Grand Openings will converge twice daily for recurring performances: a music session for visitors at 12:00 p.m. in the Roy and Niuta Titus Theater 2, and tea time at 3:00 p.m. in the Marron Atrium. Grand Openings will also organize performances including, but not limited to, a singles night for MoMA visitors on July 22 and 29; a wedding performance on July 31; a musical performance by the band Liturgy on July 29; a reenactment of Kathryn Bigelow’s film Near Dark (1987), while the film simultaneously screens in the Roy and Niuta Titus Theater 1 on July 30; and a day of formal attire, for which Museum visitors will be encouraged to dress in formal clothing, on July 27.

Specific times and locations of performances will be announced daily on Twitter (@MuseumModernArt), and schedules will be posted on MoMA.org and on a large-scale calendar on the wall of the Marron Atrium.