To attend showcases, please fill out this Google Form to receive a link to the performance via Vimeo.
(All showcasing times are EST)
Wed, January 6, 2021
11:00am, Trisha Brown Dance Company, In Plain Site
“Trisha Brown: In Plain Site” pairs indoor and outdoor sites with select dances from Brown’s repertory. Each work is restaged in a dynamic relationship to the setting, amplifying Brown’s effortless affinity for naturalizing movement to the physical environment. Wendy Perron wrote in Dance Magazine: “She caused a revolution by turning to the spaces that other dance-makers don’t.” In parks, museums, and public squares, audiences revel in the intimate, up-close experience of Brown’s early works, equipment pieces, and other favorites.
Video excerpts followed by LIVE, meet-the-artist event with Carolyn Lucas, Associate Artistic Director and company dancers with moderator Kristy Edmunds, Executive and Artistic Director, UCLA’s Center for the Art of Performance.
11:30am, Ann Carlson with Inkboat, These are the Ones We Fell Among
What happens while a couple is in quarantine, the waiting and wondering is endless, and they seem to be becoming elephants ? “These are the Ones We Fell Among” marks Carlson’s first adaptation for the at-home screen. Created via international, virtual rehearsals, this commission from inkBoat and ODC Theater enters a territory somewhere between Becket and Dr. Seuss. With Carlson’s poignant sense of humor, this work embraces and faces the current predicament of collective loss on our planet.
Work-in-progress video excerpts followed by a LIVE, meet-the-artist event with Ann Carlson with moderator Carla Peterson, Director, MANCC (Maggie Allesee National Center for Choreography)
Thurs, January 7, 2021
11:00am, a canary torsi|Yanira Castro, Last Audience: a performance manual
“Last Audience: a performance manual” made during the pandemic and the social and political upheavals of 2020, reimagines performance for this time. A series of printed manuals developed in collaboration with the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, this work transforms the public into performers and makers, guided by the artists’ voices through rituals of mercy, judgment, communion, and blessing. As participants enact their own interpretation of the scores, they become both witness and creator in a personal performance of reckoning and transformation. The manual is available in printed form and as a PDF.
Video is followed by a LIVE, meet-the-artist event with artist Yanira Castro and moderator Tara Aisha Willis, Associate Curator of Performance, MCA Chicago.
11:30am, eVenti Verticali, Quadro
eVenti Verticali’s “Quadro” suspends 5 acrobats 40 feet over head of outdoor audiences in a stunning 25-minute aeriel performance. Performing on a self-designed wall that rotates and spins throughout the show, “Quadro” can be presented for daytime or nighttime audiences. eVenti Verticali makes its home in Sardinia, Italy and will be available for tour dates once borders reopen.
Video excerpts followed by a LIVE, meet-the-artist event with Claudia Muresu, Company Manager & Andrea Piallini, Co Artistic Director with moderator Kathleen Pletcher, Executive Artistic Director, FirstWorks
12:00pm, Sankofa Danzafro‘s Accommodating Lie
“Accommodating Lie” is Artistic Director Rafael Palacios’ latest full-length dance for Sankofa Danzafro, a company of dancers and musicians based in Medellin, Colombia. One hour in length, this dance showcases 7 dancers with live music performed by 3 musicians. Dismantling stereotypes, denouncing cliches, “Accommodating Lie” is a powerful call for awareness. In a series of emotional solos and duets, and group sections the Sankofa dancers embody decades of slavery and overt racism.
Video excerpts followed by LIVE, meet-the-artist event with Rafael Palacios with moderator Aaron Mattocks, Director of Programming, The Joyce Theater.
12:30pm, Sankofa Danzafro‘s Black Voices
The “Black Voices” community engagement project offers your community’s people of color the opportunity to tell their stories through both language and self-made movement. Designed for all bodies, “Black Voices” begins with the participants sharing personal narratives about their life today. The authors of the stories work one-on-one with Artistic Director Rafael Palacios via on-line sessions to translate the emotion and meaning of their written personal stories into movement. The results are ultimately performed in a culminating, streamed event. This powerful community engagement centers and uplifts Black voices in a time of a global pandemic and the reckoning that Black lives matter. “Black Voices” received its North America debut with Boston’s Celebrity Series on December 7, 2020. It will next be presented on April 14, 2021 by George Mason University’s Center for the Arts.
Selected video followed by a LIVE, meet-the-artist event with Rafael Palacios, Artistic Director with moderator Akiba Abaka, Co Artistic Director, Akiba Abaka Arts
Fri, January 8, 2021
11:00am, fuse*, Dökk
“Dökk” is a multimedia performance of light, sound, and movement with created by Italian digital art studio fuse* and performer Elena Annovi. One-hour in length, “Dökk” is a solo journey through the subconscious, taking audiences into an endless universe. It looks at the circle of life as a search for the balance between light and darkness. Using data collection technology, synthesized through an algorithm, combined with multiple projection layers and Elena’s moving body, every Dökk’s performance is an incredibly unique experience for the audience. “Dökk” will be available for touring once borders reopen, but it could also be presented as a live streamed engagement for both the-stay-at home audience and as an in person installation.
Contiguous video excerpt followed by a LIVE, meet-the-artist event with founder & Co Director, Mattia Carretti with moderator Aaron Shackelford, Director, Ferst Center.
11:30am, Monica Bill Barnes & Company, Keep Moving
Monica Bill Barnes & Robbie Saenz de Viteri collaborated with sixteen dancers from New York City’s Hunter College to create this online collection for virtual programming. “Keep Moving” offers insight into the stories of these dancers and how they are preserving their identity as artists and movers amidst a global pandemic. “Keep Moving” is delivered in 10 chapters; some are videos, some are audio only. Some chapters have specific instructions, like take a walk while you listen. Some are long, some are short. All of them try to answer the question of how a dancer, a woman who works so hard to keep moving, finds a way forward while live performance is on pause.
The LIVE introduction will be followed by time to explore the 10 chapters of “Keep Moving,” before the LIVE, meet-the-artist event with Monica Bill Barnes, Artistic Director & Robbie Saenz de Viteri, Creative Producing Director with moderator Jodee Nimerichter, Executive Director, American Dance Festival.
12:00pm, Ragamala Dance Company, Fires of Varanasi
“Fires of Varanasi: Dance of the Eternal Pilgrim” evokes a richly elaborate ritual where time is suspended and humans merge with the divine. Through images that reflect the cosmic trinity of Varanasi, India: sacred pilgrimage routes, The Ganges River, and the patron deity Shiva, the creators imagine a metaphorical and joyful crossing place. In this full-length work for 10 performers with an original, recorded score, French scenic/lighting designer Willy Cessa transforms the stage as the performers traverse the iconic stairways and landings along the river banks, performing ritual ablutions in the sacred river.
Work-in-progress video footage will be followed by a LIVE, meet-the-artist event with Ranee Ramaswamy & Aparna Ramaswamy, Co Artistic Directors with moderator with Mary Lou Aleskie, Director, Hopkins Center for the Arts.
12:30pm, Ashwini Ramaswamy, Let the Crows Come
Evoking mythography and ancestry, “Let the Crows Come” uses the metaphor of crows as messengers for the living and guides for the departed. This dance for three with live music explores how memory and homeland channel guidance and dislocation. Featuring Ramaswamy (Bharatanatyam technique), Alanna Morris-Van Tassel (Contemporary/Afro-Caribbean technique), and Berit Ahlgren (Gaga technique), Bharatanatyam dance is deconstructed and recontextualized to recall a memory that has a shared origin but is remembered differently from person to person. Composers Jace Clayton (dj/rupture) and Brent Arnold extrapolate from Prema Ramamurthy’s classical Carnatic (South Indian) score, utilizing centuries-old compositional structures as the point of departure for their sonic explorations. “Let the Crows Come” premiered in November, 2019 and is available for touring with NDP touring subsidy.
Video excerpts followed by LIVE, meet-the-artist event with choreographer Ashwini Ramaswamy with moderator Christy Bolingbroke, Exec & Artistic Director, The National Center for Choreography at The University of Akron.