Paul Taylor's American Modern Dance Lincoln Center season invites other companies to share programs with Taylor's works. Beginning in the late 1920s, American choreographers, especially those pioneering what came to be called modern dance, built companies around themselves that featured their own works only. In the past decade and this one, we have seen a variety of ways in which … [Read more...]
Archives for 2015
Paul’s Worlds
Paul Taylor's American Modern Dance is inaugurated at Lincoln Center (March 11-29). Programming Paul Taylor’s new-to-New-York Sea Lark between his profoundly beautiful Arden Court (1981) and the equally gorgeous Esplanade (1975) during the Taylor company’s Lincoln Center season seems hardly fair to a piece that has little more in mind than a beach romp. You almost want to inquire, “Who let … [Read more...]
The Merce Resurrection
Compagnie CNDC d'Angers stages a Merce Cunningham Event in New York City. When Merce Cunningham decided that his company should be disbanded two years after his death, it wasn’t entirely clear what he expected to happen to the nearly 200 dances that he had made over the course of five decades. Some, of course, had been lost along the way, but a good number had been filmed, and more were … [Read more...]
Moving Toward the Light
Ronald K.Brown celebrates at the Joyce Theater the 30th anniversary of his Evidence: A Dance Company. Sometimes I think of choreographer Ronald K. Brown, the artistic director of Evidence: A Dance Company, as akin to a spiritually inspired basket maker, weaving beautiful strands of dancing together with time-honed skill. These strands mesh in patterns formed by eight passionate, spirited … [Read more...]
In the Heat of the Dance
The Kate Weare Dance Company celebrates its tenth anniversary at New York's BAM Fisher. Before the second performance of the Kate Weare Company’s season at BAM Fisher, Weare addressed the audience. The season marked her company’s tenth anniversary, and she wanted to praise the dancers. She mentioned their courage, their daring, and more. They were, she said, her heroes. They’re my heroes … [Read more...]
Martha Graham and her Heritage
The Martha Graham Dance Company brings new and old works to the Joyce. I only recently realized that Martha Graham must have been choreographing her evening-length Clytemnestra and Embattled Garden at more or less the same time. Both premiered during her company’s 1958 season. Perhaps she needed a respite from the marital quarrels, passions, and jealousies that precipitated the Trojan War. … [Read more...]
Nothing To Be Ashamed Of
Douglas Dunn + Dancers premiere Aidos at BAM Fisher. Aidos seems to have been a goddess slightly confused about her own identity. No wonder she is said to be the last of the Greek gods to leave earth after the Golden Age. The Random House Dictionary of the English Language calls her “the personification of conscience,” but she is also seen as representing shame and modesty. I see a … [Read more...]
Filming Dance, Dancing Films
The 43rd annual Dance on Camera Festival at Lincoln Center. The coats, the hats, the scarves, the shawls, the gloves, the bag, the boots. You needed them for the long, cold walk along West 65th Street in late January and early February. And then, when you got to the Walter Reade Theater, where most of the screenings in the 2015 Dance on Camera Festival took place, you had to shed these … [Read more...]
Tripartite Triumph
Three choreographers shower their talents on New York City Ballet The only perplexing thing about Justin Peck’s new work for the New York City Ballet is its diacritically enriched title: ‘Rōdē,ō: Four Dance Episodes. In every other way, his ballet for a company in which he is both a soloist and its resident choreographer is clear, brilliant, and brave. Brave because he has set his work to … [Read more...]
How Beautiful Can Age Be?
Miguel Gutierrez's Age & Beauty, Parts 1 and 2, presented during American Realness 2015. I didn’t see Miguel Gutierrez’s Age & Beauty Part 1: Mid-Career Artist/Suicide Note or &:/ when it was first performed as part of the 2014 Whitney Biennial. Instead I saw it in Studio C of Gibney Dance’s Agnes Varis Performing Arts Center (the rescued and handsomely re-conceived former Dance … [Read more...]