this week in dance

ALVIN AILEY AMERICAN DANCE THEATER NY CITY CENTER SEASON

Robert Moses’s THE PLEASURE OF THE LESSON will makes its Ailey company premiere at City Center (photo by Paul Kolnik)

New York City Center
130 West 56th St. between Sixth & Seventh Aves.
December 3 – January 4, $25-$150
212-581-1212
www.alvinailey.org
www.nycitycenter.org

Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater has something extra special to celebrate this year, as the company prepares for its annual holiday season at City Center. Their founder, Alvin Ailey, who started the troupe in 1958 and passed away in 1989, will be posthumously honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom on November 24, to be accepted by current AAADT artistic director Robert Battle. In addition, longtime chairman of the board Joan H. Weill is retiring, going out with a bang, as more than $40 million has been raised in her honor so far for in the Campaign for Ailey’s Future. The season begins December 3 with an opening-night gala featuring Battle’s Unfold, with live music by Romanian soprano Angela Gheorghiu, the company premiere of Hofesh Schechter’s Uprising, and the Ailey classic Revelations, also with live music. Making its world premieres over the course of the month are Matthew Rushing’s Odetta, a tribute to the singer-songwriter and activist, and Robert Moses’s The Pleasure of the Lesson, while the other company premieres are Christopher Wheeldon’s After the Rain (Pas de Deux), Asadata Dafora’s Awassa Astrige / Ostrich, and Jacqulyn Buglisi’s Suspended Women.

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

Continuing through January 4, the season also includes new productions of Ulysses Dove’s Bad Blood and Hans van Manen’s Polish Pieces; the always popular “Ailey/Ellington” program, consisting of Night Creature, Pas de Duke, The River, and Revelations; Saturday afternoon family matinees followed by Q&As with the dancers; and “Celebrating the Women of Ailey,” a presentation on December 16 honoring the fabulous Linda Celeste Sims, Hope Boykin, and the rest of the Ailey women with Cry, Night Creature, an excerpt from Vespers, and Revelations. Among the returning favorites are David Parsons’s blinding Caught, Ronald K. Brown’s elegant Four Corners and Grace, Ohad Naharin’s rapturous Minus 16, Battle’s dizzying Takademe, and Bill T. Jones’s D-Man in the Waters (Part 1). And for New Year’s Eve, Revelations will be performed by past and present members of the company.

OXBOW

Ivy Baldwin Dance makes its BAM debut with OXBOW (photo by Andy Romer)

2014 NEXT WAVE FESTIVAL
BAM Fisher, Fishman Space
321 Ashland Pl.
November 13-16, $20
718-636-4100
www.bam.org
www.ivybaldwindance.org

Brooklyn-based choreographer Ivy Baldwin is having quite a year. While celebrating the fifteenth anniversary of her company, Ivy Baldwin Dance, she was named a Guggenheim Fellow, and this week she will make her BAM debut with Oxbow, an evening-length work she made as the 2014 Harkness Foundation Artist in Residence at the BAM Fisher. The work was created in collaboration with dancers Anna Carapetyan, Lawrence Cassella, Eleanor Smith, and Katie Workum and features a live-mixed score by Justin Jones and additional music by Ryan Tracy. The twisted-paper set is by installation artists Wade Kavanaugh and Stephen B. Nguyen, with lighting by Michael O’Connor and costumes by Alice Ritter. In such previous pieces as Ambient Cowboy and Here Rests Peggy, Baldwin has displayed a unique visual flair and compelling sense of narrative likely to continue with Oxbow, described as “exploring the inexorable nature of the two forces that contain us all: space and time, geology and chronology.” The piece runs November 13-16, with tickets only twenty dollars.

GIBNEY DANCE: DoublePlus

Jennifer Meckley and Fiona Lundie perform in Abby Zbikowski’s “Destabilizer,” part of Gibney Dance’s DoublePlus series celebrating the opening of its new downtown space (photo by Nick Fancher)

Gibney Dance Performing Arts Center
280 Broadway between Chambers & Reade Sts.
Wednesday through Saturday, November 5 – December 20, $15, 7:30
www.gibneydance.org

Gibney Dance is celebrating its expansion to 280 Broadway with the six-week series DoublePlus, in which six established choreographers will curate programs by two up-and-coming dance creators. Founded in 1991 at 890 Broadway by Gina Gibney “to bring the possibility of movement to where it otherwise would not exist,” the company has now taken over 280 Broadway, the former home of Dance New Amsterdam by City Hall. Wednesday night shows will be preceded by a Meet the Curator talk, while Friday night performances will be followed by a discussion with the curator and dance artists. The series was developed by founding artistic director Gibney and new director of programs and presentation Craig T. Peterson as part of the company’s mission of “Making Space for Dance.” Gibney explained, “What we’re interested in building is a fully supported artistic ‘ecosystem’ that puts to use the unique set of resources at our disposal to benefit all of the communities we’ve been serving for the past twenty-two years: artists, audiences, and the vulnerable populations we reach through our Community Action Program.” The Community Action Program brings together dancers with domestic violence survivors for special programs and workshops. For the DoublePlus program, Annie-B Parson mentors Audrey Hailes (Death Made Love to My Feet) and Royal Osiris Karaoke Ensemble (The Art of Luv) November 5-8, RoseAnne Spradlin leads Daria Faïn (is as if alone) and Gillian Walsh (Continued™ Procedures) November 12-15, Miguel Gutierrez oversees Rakiya A. Orange (Aziza) and Alex Rodabaugh (g1br33l) November 19-22, Donna Uchizono counsels Alex Escalante (Venado) and Molly Poerstel (Stolen Grounds) December 3-6, Jon Kinzel advises Anna Azrieli (Averaging) and Stuart Shugg (Dear Washing Machine, Long Night) December 10-13, and Bebe Miller coaches Maree ReMalia (merrygogo) and Abby Zbikowski (Destabilizer) December 17-20.

TANZTHEATER WUPPERTAL PINA BAUSCH: KONTAKTHOF

Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch’s KONTAKTHOF is finally making its BAM debut after thirty-six years (photo by Julieta Cervantes)

BAM Howard Gilman Opera House
Peter Jay Sharp Building
230 Lafayette Ave.
October 23 – November 2, $25-$110
718-636-4100
www.bam.org
www.pina-bausch.de/en

Shortly before a recent performance of Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch’s much-loved Kontakthof began, I bumped into longtime dancer and current rehearsal director Dominique Mercy, who was surveying the situation from the back of BAM’s Howard Gilman Opera House. I let him know that the primary reason I got into writing about dance is because of Pina Bausch; the first piece of contemporary dance theater I ever saw (at the behest of my wife) was the company’s Danzón at BAM back in 1999, changing everything I ever thought about dance, and that I had seen every Bausch work brought to Brooklyn since then. He put his hand on my shoulder, smiled, and said, “I’m so sorry. I take the blame.” Of course, there is nothing for Mercy or the immensely talented German troupe to apologize for; they’ve been delighting audiences around the world for more than forty years with their unique brand of performance, rife with movement, music, humor, and a special relationship with the audience. At the beginning of 1978’s seminal Kontakthof, which is finishing up its BAM debut November 2, the members of the company move to the front of the stage, show off their clothing (men in dark suits, women in beautiful gowns, designed by Rolf Borzik), run their hands over their hair, and open their mouth and grit their teeth. For the next two and a half hours, they engage in a series of gender-based antics and situations, all taking place in a dance hall / rehearsal studio with chairs along three sides. They occasionally speak into microphones, glide across the floor in unison, collapse in a fury, scream, and taunt and tease one another as a wide range of prerecorded music plays, from Anton Karas’s Third Man theme and Jimmy Dorsey’s “J. D.’s Boogie” to Lesso-Valerio’s “Liebeszweifel” and Ralph Benatzky’s “Einmal ist keinmal,” performed primarily by Juan Lossas und sein Tango-Orchester, who contribute several original songs as well.

KONTAKTHOF explores the battle of the sexes in unique ways (photo by Julieta Cervantes)

Kontakthof, which can be translated as “Contact Zone,” “Meeting Place,” or “Contact of Courtyard,” has been performed by senior citizens and teenagers in addition to the regular company, each age group bringing a different nuance to the piece. At BAM, the regular company, which itself consists of performers of different ages, sizes, shapes, and nationalities, brought the piece to invigorating life, melding pain with pleasure as men and women fight it out onstage, always with a wink at the audience. Several dancers even approach the front row and ask for change so they can erotically ride a mechanical pony meant for children. Even as it occasionally gets repetitive, Kontakthof is a joy to behold, another masterpiece from Bausch, who passed away in 2009 at the age of fifty-eight but whose legacy lives on in the rich talent of her company, which is now in the clearly capable hands of longtime TR dancer Lutz Förster, who was named artistic director in April 2013. Seeing Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch every few years is like seeing old friends, catching up, finding out what they’re up to (the wonderful Nazareth Panadero, for example, won the 2014 Spanish National Dance Award for Interpretación), and then marveling at what’s been gained — and lost — over the passage of time. And for all of that, I don’t mind blaming Dominique Mercy one bit.

FIRST SATURDAYS: CROSSING BROOKLYN

Brooklyn Museum
200 Eastern Parkway at Washington St.
Saturday, November 1, free, 5:00 – 11:00
212-864-5400
www.brooklynmuseum.org

For its November edition of its free First Saturdays program, the Brooklyn Museum is looking at its home borough. Crossing Brooklyn will feature live performances by the PitchBlak Brass Band, Meridian Lights, John Robinson & PVD, and Norte Maar; a screening of the UnionDocs collaborative web documentary the Living Los Sures about the south side of Williamsburg; a book reading and talk by Bridgett M. Davis, author of Into the Go-Slow; a collage workshop; and a talk by assistant curator of contemporary art Rujeko Hockley on the exhibition “Crossing Brooklyn: Art from Bushwick, Bed-Stuy, and Beyond.” In addition, you can check out such other exhibitions as “Judith Scott — Bound and Unbound,” “Revolution! Works from the Black Arts Movement,” “Killer Heels: The Art of the High-Heeled Shoe,” and “Judy Chicago’s Feminist Pedagogy and Alternative Spaces.”

DANCING DREAMS: TEENAGERS DANCE PINA BAUSCH’S “CONTACT ZONE”

DANCING DREAMS offers teens the chance to work with dance-theater legend Pina Bausch

TANZTRÄUME: JUGENDLICHE TANZEN “KONTAKTHOF” VON PINA BAUSCH (DANCING DREAMS: TEENAGERS DANCE PINA BAUSCH’S “CONTACT ZONE”) (Anne Linsel & Rainer Hoffmann, 2010)
BAMcinématek, BAM Rose Cinemas
30 Lafayette Ave. between Ashland Pl. & St. Felix St.
Monday, October 27, $14, 7:30
718-636-4100
www.bam.org
www.pina-bausch.de/en

From 1973 until her death in 2009, legendary dancer and choreographer Pina Bausch ran Tanztheater Wuppertal, the German company that changed the face of dance theater forever with such seminal productions as Rite of Spring, Café Müller, Danzón, Masurca Fogo, and so many others, many of which had their U.S. premieres at BAM. In 1978 she staged Kontakthof, collaborating with Rolf Borzik, Marion Cito, and Hans Pop, set to music by Juan Llossas, Charlie Chaplin, Anton Karas, Sibelius, and other composers. In 2000, she revisited the piece with a cast of senior citizens, and eight years later she turned the roles over to a group of Wuppertal high schoolers, most of whom had never heard of her and had never danced before. Director Anne Linsel and cinematographer Rainer Hoffmann follow the development of this very different production in Dancing Dreams, speaking with the eager, nervous participants, who talk openly and honestly about their hopes and desires, as well as with rehearsal directors Jo-Ann Endicott and Bénédicte Billet, who do not treat the teens with kid gloves but instead are trying to get them to reach deep inside of themselves and hold nothing back. When Bausch shows up to choose the final cast, telling the teenagers that she doesn’t bite, the tension mounts. Dancing Dreams is an intimate look at the creative process, about dedication and determination and what it takes to be an artist. It suffers at times from feeling too much like a reality television show, mixing American Idol and So You Think You Can Dance with the fictional Glee, but it also offers a last glimpse at Bausch, whose final interview is captured in the film. “You might think I’ve had enough of Kontakhtof,” she says at one point. “But every time it’s a new thing.” Dancing Dreams is screening October 27 at 7:30 in conjunction with the current production of Kontakhtof running at BAM October 23 – November 2 and will be followed by a Q&A with longtime Tanztheater Wuppertal members Billiet and Dominique Mercy, moderated by Marina Harss. In addition, on October 25 at 12 noon, BAM and Dance Umbrella will present a free live stream of “Politics of Participation,” a cross-Atlantic panel discussion at King’s College with Penny Woolcock, Matt Fenton, Kenrick “H2O” Sandy, and Michael “Mikey J” Asante and at BAM with Julie Anne Stanzak and Simon Dove, moderated by Dr. Daniel Glaser.

NEXT WAVE FESTIVAL: KONTAKTHOF

Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch’s KONTAKTHOF returns to BAM after nearly thirty years (photo by Oliver Look)

BAM Howard Gilman Opera House
Peter Jay Sharp Building
230 Lafayette Ave.
October 23 – November 2, $25-$110
718-636-4100
www.bam.org
www.pina-bausch.de/en

To celebrate Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch’s thirtieth anniversary of its New York debut at BAM — the German company presented Rite of Spring, 1980, Cafe Muller, and Bluebeard back in June 1984 — the innovative, influential, and highly entertaining troupe is bringing back one of its most famous works October 23 – November 2 at BAM’s Howard Gilman Opera House as part of the 2014 Next Wave Festival. First performed at BAM in October 1985, Kontakthof (“Courtyard of Contact”) is a playful look at the world of dance itself, as well-dressed men and women battle it out in an intensely physical competition with plenty of fun humor. The work, which includes music by Charlie Chaplin, Anton Karas, Nino Rota, Jean Sibelius, and Juan Llossas and costume and set design by Rolf Borzik, has been performed by teenagers and senior citizens since its premiere in 1978; at BAM, the current company will take the stage, led by such familiar mainstays as Rainer Behr, Dominique Mercy, Eddie Martinez, Julie Anne Stanzak, Franko Schmidt, Cristiana Morganti, Andrey Berezin, and the inimitable Nazareth Panadero. The company is continuing on following Bausch’s death in 2009 at the age of fifty-eight, with longtime TW dancer Lutz Förster as artistic director. It’s always an event when they come to Brooklyn, having dazzled dance-theater lovers with such thrilling productions as Vollmond (Full Moon), “…como el musguito en la piedra, ay si, si, si…” (Like moss on a stone), Danzón, Nefés, Masurca Fogo, and so many others over these last thirty years. If you’ve never seen this fabulous company in person, stop what you’re doing right now and pick up some tickets while they’re still left; you won’t be disappointed. You can also check out Wim Wenders’s Oscar-nominated Pina on Netflix to get a taste of what you’re in for. In conjunction with Kontakthof, on October 25 at 12 noon BAM and Dance Umbrella will present a free live stream of “Politics of Participation,” a cross-Atlantic panel discussion at King’s College with Penny Woolcock, Matt Fenton, Kenrick “H2O” Sandy, and Michael “Mikey J” Asante and at BAM with Stanzak and Simon Dove, moderated by Dr. Daniel Glaser. And on October 27 at 7:30, BAMcinématek will screen Dancing Dreams: Teenagers Dance Pina Bausch’s “Contact Zone,” followed by a Q&A with longtime Tanztheater Wuppertal members Bénédicte Billiet and Mercy, moderated by Marina Harss.