AFDT will present EVENFALL in near-total darkness at the Joyce SoHo (photo by Elazar Harel)
Joyce SoHo
155 Mercer St. between Houston & Prince Sts.
May 5-7, $18, 8:00
212-242-0800
www.joyce.org
www.afdancetheater.org
San Francisco–based Alyce Finwall Dance Theater will present the New York premiere of their evening-length piece Evenfall at the Joyce SoHo this week, a work for eight women performed in near darkness. The limited lighting often makes the exposed skin of the dancers’ faces, arms, and legs the only visible elements, except when they remove each other’s black costumes, furthering their examination of feminine identity, innocence, and intimacy. Consisting primarily of slow-paced solos, duets, and trios that emphasize stretched motion, Evenfall is a collaboration with sound and video environmental artist Andrea Williams and electronic-music composer Carson Whitley, who fill the space with birdsong and other peaceful outdoor nature sounds. AFDT, whose stated mission “is to blend an unabashed movement language with dramatic expression and wry humor to create a powerful vehicle for theatrical dance,” made Evenfall as part of San Francisco’s Garage Theater Resident Artist Workshop (RAW); the piece features Madelyn Biven, Julia Hollas, Emily Jones, Malinda LaVelle, Kaitlin Parks, Joy Prendergast, Maggie Stack, and Emmaly Wiederholt. The May 6 performance will be followed by a discussion with members of the creative team.