They say great art should make you reevaluate or challenge the way you perceive the world. Leaving 3LD Art & Technology Center in lower Manhattan after Andrew Schneider’s YOUARENOWHERE, the world seemed like a new place altogether. The buildings seemed taller, the sky certainly looked clearer, and there was something about my reflection in the large glass panes on my way to the subway that made me pause and take a second glance. In less than 90 minutes, Schneider bombards you with facts, lights and philosophical questions that may lead to hours, days even, of ruminations. Most surprising of all, the show is also extremely entertaining.

Schneider is a skilled performer who in YOUARENOWHERE becomes a combination of Tyler Durden, Joel Grey’s Emcee from Cabaret, and even Al Jolson. He shifts from hyperactive masculinity, to sad clown mannerisms, to romantic hero by way of Beckett in seconds, creating the rare performance where you truly have no idea what’s coming next. If the show itself proves hard to describe, at least hard to describe without “spoiling” key moments, it often serves its purpose best, because at the heart of the matter is Schneider’s notion that art, regardless of plot, text and the space where it’s performed will always mean something different to each individual. I spoke to Schneider about the ideas behind YOUARENOWHERE, his clever use of technology, and his unique brand of storytelling.

The show was mind blowing so congratulations. Once the show was over there was a split second or so when you could feel people were unsure about what to do next, should they applaud, would there be another scene? It made us all very aware of how time operates in theatre and how time divisions are created.

I’m not really making theatre, I’m making time based art that happens to take place in a theater. I need the audience’s attention to be focused so I can manipulate it. This is a really great medium to be able to do it.

So it’s not like an act of rebellion towards what people expect a show to be like?

I’m not trying to rebel against anything, I just happen to make the work that I happen to make. I find it very unhelpful to talk about things within: is it theatre? Is it performance? I’m never thinking about that when I’m making work, it’s just work. Whatever happens “being” is what it is. This ended up being a performance rather than an installation. It’s a time based performance which in this case has a beginning, a middle and an ending. It’s not like I’m trying to fuck with anybody, but because “it’s over now”, there’s nothing else to be done. If I can transport you home after the show I would, but I can’t do that. I try to create an experience where people can stick around afterwards and talk about it.

Having no traditional plot makes the show completely free of spoilers, and yet it feels like a show that people will want to talk about. Is it exciting to know you can provoke that?

Right, it’s exciting but it’s also hard to get people to come (laughs) It’s hard to publicize that. How do you get to have people come to a thing they can’t explain? I guess it is exciting, I never thought about it being exciting. There’s no plot per se, but you can definitely do a play by play of what happens. However the experience is the experience and nothing can change that. Even getting grants is tough because we explain the “blackout” but you can’t experience it like people do in the theater. The cues go beyond cues. I’m trying to move people within a shared experience, no one really knows what’s going on and realizing that makes people feel OK, they let that was over them and get an experience rather than a story.

In The Wizard of Oz we are instructed not to pay attention to the man behind the curtain and your show is saying: pay attention to the man behind the curtain! We see everything from your sweat and makeup going down your face, plus you’re constantly referring to the tech people, I believe you control the technical aspects with the devices you wear on your arms, right?

We made some of the show using wireless sensors and the way the show runs now is a huge collection of pre-programmed cues and a lot of people running stuff live. We’re always looking at ways to use misdirection and pointing people’s attention to where it shouldn’t be. It’s funny about “the man behind the curtain” because if you watch the first half I’m constantly pointing at the curtain. I get pretty obvious with things.

It’s also a way to give props to all the people who help put together a show, rather than just the performers which is quite democratic. Do you ever think of that as a political statement?

I haven’t, never. But I don’t think there’s a point in hiding anything in our show, we’re never transported anywhere, we’re not in 15th century Ireland, we’re in New York City in a studio and that’s the only place we ever are in.

We sometimes tend to think that technology has nothing to do with human contact or anything metaphysical so to speak. However with your show and how LEDs sometimes look like constellations, and something like the device you made called the PROLIXUS which basically gives someone’s voice to another person - which I saw as an exercise in developing empathy - it’s like you’re creating a bridge between technology and the soul, so to speak.

Everything that is technological in the show is in service of the human, even the stuff that’s meant to work on you as aggressive, it’s meant to be aggressive so that when we come away from it we’re left with humanness. The LEDs are constellations because the only way I figured out how to do stars was with LEDs, so it doesn’t feel technological when we do it.

You actually ask people to stay and give you feedback on the show, does this mean you’re always working on the show and updating it?

Every day we show up a couple hours earlier and we rehearse things that we think could work better, or things we didn’t get to do to begin with. We’re constantly making changes, sometimes based on what people say and sometimes based on maybe things we wanted to try last year. Every house is different, every venue affects the show.

The first time I became aware of your work was with DANCE/FIELD which obviously for its very nature made me think of classic Broadway musicals. Using your skills and technology, if you could do your own version of a classic show what would it be?

It’s funny, I wanna tell new stories I guess. Those stories have already been told and they’ve probably been told in the best way they can be told, which is probably traditional narrative. These stories are so good and these actors are so good that you’re in that world they created. That’s the best way to see that. That’s the best way to see that film, like it was done in 1950. That’s the best version of that play that’s ever existed...I think there’s a fascination of revisiting these concepts with new technology just because there is new technology, and I don’t think that helps. I’m interested in the new stories we can tell with this new shit that we have. I don’t wanna go and butcher Hamlet with surveillance cameras.

YOUARENOWHERE is playing at 3LD Art & Technology Center. For tickets and more click here.