this week in dance

AMERICAN REALNESS — OTRO TEATRO: THE PLEASURE PROJECT BY LUCIANA ACHUGAR

Luciana Achugar’s OTRO TEATRO is part of AMERICAN REALNESS festival at Abrons Arts Center (photo by Alex Kangangi)

Who: luciana achugar
What: Otro Teatro: The Pleasure Project, part of American Realness performance festival, which continues through January 23
Where: Abrons Arts Center Playhouse, 466 Grand St. at Pitt St., 212-598-0400
When: Tuesday, January 13, 6:00, Thursday, January 15, 6:30, and Saturday, January 17, 4:30, $20
Why: Brooklyn-based choreographer and dancer luciana achugar (Feeling Is Believing, Puro Deseo, The Sublime Is Us) concludes three-month exploration of public intervention, individual and collective ritualized movement, and the interaction between performer and spectator, taking place in a metaphorical “theater in ruins”

COIL 2015 — MOLLY LIEBER + ELEANOR SMITH: RUDE WORLD

Molly Lieber and Eleanor Smith come together as one in revealing new work (photo by Maria Baranova)

The Chocolate Factory Theater
5-49 49th Ave., Long Island City
January 7-12, $20
718-482-7069
www.ps122.org/rude-world
www.chocolatefactorytheater.org

With Rude World, Molly Lieber and Eleanor Smith conclude their intimate trilogy that started with 2012’s Beautiful Bone and continued with 2013’s Tulip, a trio of works danced and choreographed by the two women, who have been collaborating since 2006. Part of PS122’s COIL festival, Rude World takes place in the black box space at Long Island City’s Chocolate Factory, with two rows of folding chairs at the north and south ends and black curtains forming the east and west sides. The forty-five-minute improvisation-based performance begins as Lieber and Smith, both naked, enter the small, dark room. Lieber sits on a reserved chair as Smith stands right in front of her. Over the course of several minutes, Lieber slowly caresses Smith’s body, from shoulder blades to calves, while her face moves into Smith’s backside. The only sound heard is that of a far-off ventilation system, barely audible, as well as the soft gulps of the audience members. The opening sets the tone for the rest of the show, as each dancer gets a solo in which they embrace the space with runs and jumps; in between, the central section features their bodies entwining, virtually becoming one as they twist, turn, and roll, pushing and pulling each other, using various body parts in a creative vocabulary of movement bordering on the sexual. They also stand face-first against the black curtain, slowly moving up and down as if trying to merge with the barrier. Through it all, Madeline Best’s lighting shifts ever so subtly, melding with the silence, which is interrupted only by Lieber’s and Smith’s heavy breathing — and yet more audience gulps.

Developed during a residency at the Baryshnikov Arts Center, Rude World is a mesmerizing work that gently tantalizes and taunts the audience. Lieber, who has danced for luciana achugar, Neil Greenberg, Maria Hassabi, Juliette Mapp, and Melinda Ring, and Smith, who has performed with Ivy Baldwin, Katie Workum, Juliana F. May, Vanessa Anspaugh, and Molly Poerstel, boldly reveal themselves, daring the crowd to look at them and their bodies. The piece gets confusing when each dancer puts on at least one article of clothing, perhaps emphasizing the nudity too much. But the brief wardrobe changes also tell the audience that the dancers know that they’re being examined in a way costumed dancers aren’t, with usually hidden body parts on view and moving along with hands, legs, heads, etc. Of course, nudity in contemporary dance is nothing new, but it can still be bold and thrilling when used in intelligent, unique ways.

FIRST SATURDAY: “CROSSING BROOKLYN” ARTISTS’ CHOICE

Brooklyn Museum
200 Eastern Parkway at Washington St.
Saturday, January 3, free, 5:00 – 11:00
212-864-5400
www.brooklynmuseum.org

The Brooklyn Museum welcomes in 2015 by handing over the reins of its free monthly First Saturdays program to several of the artists featured in “Crossing Brooklyn: Art from Bushwick, Bed-Stuy, and Beyond,” which concludes on January 4. The night before, curators Eugenie Tsai and Rujeko Hockley will discuss the exhibition at 5:30, “Crossing Brooklyn” artist Linda Goode Bryant will talk about urban farming at 6:15, jazz percussionist Ches Smith will activate David Horvitz’s forty-seven suspended bells as part of a site-specific musical composition at 6:30, and BFAMFAPhD (Blair Murphy, Susan Jahoda, and Vicky Virgin) will delve into the nature of creativity and debt at 7:15. “‘Crossing Brooklyn’ Artists’ Choice” also features live performances by Snarky Puppy, DJ Selly and DJ Asen from Fon, ventriloquist Nigel “Docta Gel” Dunkley (telling the story of Cindy Hot Chocolate from Geltown), immersive dance company Ani Taj and the Dance Cartel, Fela! veterans Chop and Quench led by Sahr Ngaujah, and spoken word poets Corina Copp, Patricia Spears Jones, Rickey Laurentiis, and Charles North as well as Greg Barris’s “Heart of Darkness” comedy showcase with Janeane Garofalo and Ilana Glazer, a print-making art workshop, a creative writing workshop led by Jaime Shearn Coan, and D’hana Perry’s multimedia improvisational “LOOSE.” In addition, you can check out such exhibitions as “Revolution! Works from the Black Arts Movement,” “Judith Scott — Bound and Unbound,” and “Chitra Ganesh: Eyes of Time.”

ALVIN AILEY AMERICAN DANCE THEATER: ALL NEW 2014-15

The Ailey men strut their stuff in Hofesh Schechter’s dazzling UPRISING (photo by Paul Kolnik)

New York City Center
130 West 56th St. between Sixth & Seventh Aves.
Through January 4, $25-$150
212-581-1212
www.alvinailey.org
www.nycitycenter.org

Hofesh Schechter’s 2006 Uprising charged out of the gate at City Center on December 28, kicking off Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater’s all-new program with a vengeance. Jeroboam Bozeman, Antonio Douthit-Boyd, Kirven Douthit-Boyd, Yannick Lebrun, Jamar Roberts, Jermaine Terry, and Marcus Jarrell Willis emerge from the smoky shadows and march to the front of the stage, then spend the next twenty-six minutes immersed in acts of powerful aggression, animal-like scoots low to the floor, and playful in-fighting, all set to the Jerusalem-born, London-based choreographer’s percussive, electronic score (with Vex’d), with superb lighting by Lee Curran that keeps things dark and mysterious. Six of the men wear relatively drab-colored clothing except for Willis, whose red shirt stands out as the men foment an unstated revolution. Restaged by Bruno Guillore, Uprising, which will next be performed on December 31 at 2:00, is an exhilarating piece that shows off the vast talent of the Ailey men, led by an impressive Roberts.

The Ailey women take center stage in Jacqulyn Buglisi’s haunting SUSPENDED WOMEN (photo by Paul Kolnik)

Uprising was followed by Suspended Women, which gives a chance for the Ailey women to strut their stuff. Choreographed by New York City native Jacqulyn Buglisi, the eighteen-minute work features fifteen women wearing long gowns, petticoats, and hoop skirts (the lovely costumes are by A. Christina Giannini), led by the ever-elegant Linda Celeste Sims in pink and Hope Boykin in purple, spinning, twirling, subsiding to the floor and rising again, sometimes delicately, sometimes robustly, to music by Maurice Ravel, with interpolations by Daniel Bernard Roumain (DBR). On several occasions, four men enter the picture, bare-chested in suit jackets and dark pants, but this is all about the ladies. The haunting 2000 piece was inspired by seventeenth-century nun and author Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz “and is dedicated to all women since the beginning of time ‘suspended,’” Buglisi explains in a program note. Indeed, this energizing work, which will next be performed on January 4 at 3:00, lets these glorious women shine.

Matthew Rushing’s ODETTA honors the singer-songwriter and activist on the fiftieth anniversary of the Civil Rights Act (photo by Steve Wilson)

The all-new program concluded with former Ailey star dancer and current rehearsal director and guest artist Matthew Rushing’s third piece for the company, ODETTA, an overly earnest tribute to folksinger and civil rights activist Odetta Holmes. Rushing, who previously choreographed 2005’s Acceptance in Surrender with Boykin and Abdur-Rahim Jackson and 2009’s overly earnest Harlem Renaissance homage Uptown, once again creates movement that works too literally with the soundtrack, which includes Odetta’s iconic performances of “This Little Light of Mine,” “John Henry,” “Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child,” and “A Hole in the Bucket,” a duet with Harry Belafonte. Akua Noni Parker is vibrant embodying Odetta, who passed away in 2008 at the age of seventy-seven, but Rushing adds unnecessary video projections by Stephen Alcorn and a confusing quartet of interlocking bench artworks by Travis George to his straightforward narrative, which reaches its nadir when he lowers an American flag and adds army helmets to the male dancers as Odetta sings Bob Dylan’s “Masters of War.” Rushing, who so excelled at interpreting other choreographers’ work, needs to develop a more inventive and creative movement vocabulary for his dancers, relying less on mere heartfelt passion and more on insight and ingenuity. That said, ODETTA, which will next be performed December 31 at 2:00 (what would have been Odetta’s eighty-fourth birthday), received the most rapturous applause of the evening.

JANUARY PERFORMANCE FESTIVALS

Who: COIL
What: Interdisciplinary festival featuring dance, theater, music, art, and discussion, organized by PS 122
Where: Baryshnikov Arts Center, Chocolate Factory, Vineyard Theatre, Invisible Dog Art Center, the Swiss Institute, Asia Society, Parkside Lounge, New Ohio Theatre, Danspace Project, Times Square
When: January 2-17, free – $30
Why: Dancers and choreographers Molly Lieber and Eleanor Smith in Rude World; Temporary Distortion’s durational multimedia live installation My Voice Has an Echo in It; Faye Driscoll’s extraordinary, interactive Thank You for Coming: Attendance; Alexandra Bachzetsis’s Diego Velázquez-inspired From A to B via C

Who: Under the Radar Festival and Incoming!
What: Interdisciplinary festival featuring dance, theater, music, and art, organized by the Public Theater
Where: The Public Theater, 425 Lafayette St., and La MaMa, 74 East Fourth St.
When: January 7-18, free – $40
Why: Daniel Fish’s A (radically condensed and expanded) Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again based on audio recordings of David Foster Wallace; Marie-Caroline Hominal’s The Triumph of Fame, a one-on-one performance inspired by Petrarch’s “I Trionfi”; Taylor Mac’s A 24-Decade History of Popular Music: 1900-1950s; Toshi Reagon’s Octavia E. Butler’s Parable of the Sower: The Concert Version; Reggie Watts’s Audio Abramović, in which Watts will go eye-to-eye with individuals for five minutes

Who: American Realness
What: Interdisciplinary festival featuring dance, theater, music, art, conversation, discussion, readings, and a workshop, organized by Abrons Arts Center
Where: Abrons Arts Center, 466 Grand St.
When: January 8-18, $20
Why: World premiere of Jack Ferver’s Night Light Bright Light; Cynthia Hopkins’s A Living Documentary; Tere O’Connor’s Undersweet; Luciana Achugar’s Otro Teatro: The Pleasure Project; My Barbarian’s The Mother and Other Plays; Dynasty Handbag’s Soggy Glasses, a Homo’s Odyssey

Who: Prototype
What: Festival of opera, theater, music, and conversation
Where: HERE, St. Paul’s Chapel, La MaMa, St. Ann’s Warehouse, Park Ave. Armory, Joe’s Pub
When: January 8-17, $22-$75
Why: The Scarlet Ibis, inspired by James Hurst’s 1960 short story; Carmina Slovenica’s Toxic Psalms; Bora Yoon’s Sunken Cathedral; Ellen Reid and Amanda Jane Shark’s Winter’s Child

Who: Winter Jazzfest NYC
What: More than one hundred jazz groups playing multiple venues in and around Greenwich Village
Where: The Blue Note, (le) poisson rouge, Judson Church, the Bitter End, Subculture, Bowery Electric, others
When: January 8-10, $25-$145
Why: Catherine Russell, David Murray Infinity Quartet with Saul Williams, Jovan Alexandre & Collective Consciousness, Marc Ribot & the Young Philadelphians with Strings, So Percussion Feat. Man Forever, Theo Bleckmann Quartet with Ambrose Akinmusire, and David Murray Clarinet Summit with Don Byron, David Krakauer, and Hamiet Bluiett

THALIA DOCS — BORN TO FLY: ELIZABETH STREB vs. GRAVITY

Documentary reveals how Elizabeth Streb and her Extreme Action Company (including Jackie Carlson, seen here) take dance to a whole new level

BORN TO FLY: ELIZABETH STREB vs. GRAVITY (Catherine Gund, 2014)
Symphony Space, Leonard Nimoy Thalia
2537 Broadway at 95th St.
Sunday, December 21 & 28 and January 4, $14, 4:30
212-864-5400
www.symphonyspace.org
www.borntoflymovie.com

Over the last several years, New Yorkers have gotten the chance to see Elizabeth Streb’s Extreme Action Company perform such dazzling works as Ascension at Gansevoort Plaza, Kiss the Air! at the Park Avenue Armory, and Human Fountain at World Financial Center Plaza as her team of gymnast-dancer-acrobats risk their physical well-being in daring feats of strength, stamina, durability, and grace. In addition, Streb herself walked down the outside wall of the Whitney as part of a tribute to one of her mentors, Trisha Brown. Now Catherine Gund takes viewers behind the scenes in the exhilarating documentary Born to Fly: Elizabeth Streb vs. Gravity, going deep into the mind of the endlessly inventive and adventurous extreme action architect and the courage and fearlessness of her company. Gund follows Streb as she discusses her childhood, her dance studies, the formation of STREB in 1985, and her carefully thought out views on space, line, and movement as her work stretches the limits of what the human body can do. “I think my original belief and desire is to see a human being fly,” Streb says near the beginning of the film, which includes archival footage of early performances, family photos, and a warm scene in which the Rochester-born Streb and her partner, Laura Flanders, host a dinner party in their apartment, cooking for Bill T. Jones, Bjorn Amelan, Anne Bogart, Catharine Stimpson, and A. M. Homes.

Elizabeth Streb and her partner, Laura Flanders, prepare for a dinner party in new documentary

Gund also speaks with current and past members of the talented, ever-enthusiastic company — associate artistic director Fabio Tavares, Sarah Callan, Jackie Carlson, Leonardo Giron, Felix Hess, Samantha Jakus, Cassandre Joseph, John Kasten, and Daniel Rysak — who talk about their dedication to Streb’s vision while using such words as “challenge,” “velocity,” “endurance,” “magic,” “invincibility,” and “risk” to describe what they do and how they feel about it. Gund focuses on the latter, as virtually every one of Streb’s pieces is fraught with the possibility of serious injury, as evidenced by their titles alone: Fly, Impact, Rebound, Breakthru, and Ricochet, not to mention the use of such materials as spinning I-beams, plastic barricades, dangling harnesses, and a rotating metal ladder. “I have to be able to ask someone to do that and be okay about it. Those aren’t easy requests,” Streb explains. “Knowing where you are is how you survive the work,” adds former STREB dancer Hope Clark. Gund goes with Streb to her doctor, where the choreographer describes what happened to her gnarled feet, and also meets with former dancer DeeAnn Nelson Burton, who had to retire after breaking her back. The film concludes with an inside look at STREB’s spectacular “One Extraordinary Day,” a series of hair-raising site-specific events staged for the 2012 London Olympics at such locations as the Millennium Bridge, the London Eye, and the sphere-shaped city hall, photographed by documentary legend Albert Maysles. In her Kickstarter campaign, Gund (Motherland Afghanistan, A Touch of Greatness) said, “Action architect Elizabeth Streb has reinvented the language of movement. [Born to Fly] will rewrite the language of documentary.” That’s a bold declaration, but the film does have a lot of the same spirit that Streb displays in her awe-inspiring work. Born to Fly is screening December 21 & 28 and January 4 at 4:30 as part of Symphony Space’s ongoing Thalia Docs series.

THE CHOCOLATE DANCES COSTUME PARTY TASTING PERFORMANCE

Megan Sipe combines chocolate and dance in tasty interactive evening (photo by Rachel Walters)

The C.O.W. (Celebration of Whimsy)
21-A Clinton St.
Sunday, December 14, $45-$50, 7:00
www.thecownyc.com
www.chocolatedances.com

Hey, you got chocolate in my dance piece! Well, you got your dance piece in my chocolate! Chocolatier and choreographer Megan Sipe combines two great tastes that taste great together in The Chocolate Dances, and interactive performance that incorporates dance, theater, and music with handcrafted chocolate confections that are both worn and eaten. On December 14, Sipe, who hails from Idaho, will present the latest iteration of The Chocolate Dances at a dual costume party and tasting at Celebration of Whimsy on Clinton St. in Manhattan. Every audience member will be treated to a costume, a quartet of truffles/bon bons, cacao nibs, chocolate callets, a chocolate mustache, and chocolate raspberry birthday cake. Tickets are $45 general admission but only five bucks more for prime seating. There will be live music by Juana Aquerta, Giacomo Lamparelli, and Alesio Romano, dancing by Cara Heerdt, Catherine Murcek, and Maya Orchin, and special theatrics by Andrew Broaddus and Fritz Donnelly. Sipe (Hour of the Beast, ahy-duh-hoh-uhn), who is also a Pilates instructor and a creative movement teacher, “uses chocolate to bring people together, to celebrate dance and create joy,” which ain’t a bad mission in life.