Past Show
Mister & Mischief Proudly Presents
The Narrative Treatment Plant
This facility is a playful, participatory performance piece where an afterhours crew assists guests in processing uncovered ideas into stories.
What is the Narrative Treatment Plant?
On March 8th, 2025, the Library Foundation of Los Angeles and Los Angeles Public Library, in partnership with LAist, the LA Phil, and the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, flung open the doors of Central Library and invited almost 3,000 guests to come experience an after-hours party in these hallowed halls. Authors, artists, and community organizations were all invited to bring their own unique flavors to the event. In that regard, Mister and Mischief created The Narrative Treatment Plant, taking a cue from the event's theme of "Building Stories."
We had a blast clocking in for the Narrative Treatment Plant during Night at the Library this past weekend!
Guests were on-boarded by our expert Circulation team and then assigned to a Demco guide to take them through the stacks in Central Library's Arts and Recreation wing. These guides would show guests through a short bibliomancy process to produce an idea kernel. From there, guests were brought to our processing and refinement area where their kernels were announced and inserted into our ongoing narrative product. Guests could engage in more refinement activities including illustration flocculation, context coagulation, extraction and sedimentation, or grit retrieval. Through these playful processing activities (that feel very reminiscent of games you may be familiar with) new story elements were generated and then taken by a skilled team of pages to the drop manager to have them interjected into the ongoing narrative product. And hence, the Narrative Treatment Plant continued to keep it's important work moving along.
