this week in dance

VERTIGO DANCE COMPANY: ONE. ONE & ONE

Vertigo presents US premiere of One. One & One at Baryshnikov Arts Center March 5-6

Baryshnikov Arts Center, Jerome Robbins Theater
450 West 37th St. between Ninth & Tenth Aves.
March 5-6, $25, 7:30
646-731-3200
bacnyc.org
vertigo.org.il/en

In 2017, Israel’s Vertigo Dance Company celebrated its twenty-fifth anniversary with One. One & One, a soulful, energetic production imbued with spirituality and immersed in a connection to the natural world. The company, based in the Vertigo Eco-Art Village in Kibbutz Netiv HaLamed-Heh in Jerusalem and dedicated to social and environmental awareness, will be in New York City March 5-6 to present the U.S. premiere of the work at the Baryshnikov Arts Center. The sixty-minute piece, choreographed by troupe artistic director and cofounder Noa Wertheim, is set to an original score by Avi Belleli performed by violists and vocalists Galia Hai and Oud Eliahu Dagmi and vocalist Ilai Bellelil. Ten barefoot dancers (Sian Olles, Liel Fibak, Sándor Petrovics, Shani Licht, Etai Peri, Daniel Costa, Hagar Shachal, Jeremy Alberge, Korina Fraiman, and Yotam Baruch), dressed in white or gray shirts and dark pants (the costumes are by Sasson Kedem), move about Roy Vatury’s stage, which ranges from a chessboard-like appearance (the lighting is by Dani Fishof — Magenta) to being covered in dirt, creating an ever-changing ground of abstract shapes and patterns. “In the last few decades, some wonderful dance artists have established an important place in Israel’s cultural landscape, and Vertigo Dance Company is among them. Vertigo’s excellent dancers express a distinctive voice through an impressive movement quality — visceral and raw, but with a surprising, acute sensitivity,” BAC founder and artistic director Mikhail Baryshnikov said in a statement. The title comes from a quote from Yoma, Chapter 5, Mishnah 4: “And thus would he count: one, one and one, one and two, one and three, one and four, one and five, one and six, one and seven.”

BILL CHATS

Oskar Eustis and Bill T. Jones will talk about their roles as artistic directors on February 11 at NYLA

Who: Bill T. Jones and Oskar Eustis
What: Bill Chats
Where: New York Live Arts, 219 West 19th St. between Seventh & Eighth Aves., 212-924-0077
When: Monday, February 11, $8-$10, 7:00
Why: New York Live Arts artistic director Bill T. Jones sits down with Public Theater artistic director Oskar Eustis for the next edition of his “Bill Chats” series, taking place February 11 at 7:00. Jones, an award-winning choreographer — among his many prizes are the Tony, the Obie, the 2013 National Medal of Arts, the 2010 Kennedy Center Honors, and the 1994 MacArthur Genius Award — and Eustis, who directed the controversial 2017 Shakespeare in the Park production of Julius Caesar that turned the Roman leader into Donald Trump, will discuss the current sociopolitical climate and how it impacts their decisions as artistic directors.

VERKLÄRTE NACHT: ANNE TERESA DE KEERSMAEKER / ROSAS

Cynthia Loemij and Igor Shyshko have a brief encounter in Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker’s Verklärte Nacht (photo by Maria Baranova)

Baryshnikov Arts Center, Jerome Robbins Theater
450 West 37th St. between Ninth & Tenth Aves.
January 30 – February 3, $20-$25
866-811-4111
bacnyc.org
www.rosas.be/en

Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker’s 2014 streamlined version of Verklärte Nacht (“Transfigured Night”), originally an ensemble piece from 1995, is making its New York debut this week, continuing at the Baryshnikov Arts Center’s Jerome Robbins Theater through February 3. The short but powerful forty-minute work from the Belgian choreographer’s Rosas company is inspired by German Symbolist Richard Dehmel’s 1896 poem, which itself inspired Austrian American composer Arnold Schönberg’s romantic 1899 program music (op. 4) for string sextet. Dehmel’s short poem is about a woman who decides to become a single mother, having sex with a stranger. However, after she is pregnant, she unexpectedly falls in love with another man but has to tell him that she is carrying someone else’s child. In the poem, the specific text of which is not in the show, she opines, “I am carrying a child, and not yours; / I walk in sin beside you. / I have deeply sinned against myself. / I no longer believed in happiness / And yet was full of longing / For a life with meaning, for the joy / And duty of maternity; so I dared / And, quaking, let my sex / Be taken by a stranger, / And was blessed by it. / Now life has taken its revenge, / For now I have met you, yes you.” In a piece that was initially rejected by program committees and the public, Schönberg brings to life the emotions ripping through the woman’s soul as well as the man’s. (De Keersmaeker uses a lovely recording by Pierre Boulez and the New York Philharmonic.)

Boštjan Antončič holds up Cynthia Loemij in emotional work at Baryshnikov Arts Center (photo by Maria Baranova)

The dance takes place in a stark black box theater with no accoutrements whatsoever. (The spare lighting is by De Keersmaeker and Luc Schaltin.) The opening is rendered in silence, as Cynthia Loemij (the woman) engages with Igor Shyshko (the stranger). Once the music starts, Verklärte Nacht transforms into an epic expressionistic silent film as Loemij and Boštjan Antončič as her true love repeatedly come together and separate. She falls to the floor again and again, jumps on him with her knees on his shoulder, brings his head to her belly. He stands in the corner, looking away, then runs around the space, lifting and twirling her. On the ground, she motions as if giving birth, exhibiting the pain and loneliness she expects to experience once he ultimately rejects her. She’s in a loose-fitting flower-print dress, a sign of spring and rebirth though muted, while he is in a dark suit and white shirt; both are barefoot. (The costumes are by Rosas and Rudy Sabounghi.) In some ways it is a feminist reinterpretation of thebiblical story of the Garden of Eden; the woman took a bite of a stranger’s fruit and now must face the consequences after being cast out of paradise, but Dehmel, Schönberg, and De Keersmaeker (A Love Supreme, Six Brandenburg Concertos) offer a touching finale. Although its operatic scope may feel a bit dated, the performers’ total mastery of the material and Loemij’s brilliant dancing continue to make the piece involving and compelling.

ANNE TERESA DE KEERSMAEKER / ROSAS: VERKLÄRTE NACHT

Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker and Rosas’ Verklärte Nacht has its NYC premiere this week at BAC (photo courtesy Rosas)

Baryshnikov Arts Center, Jerome Robbins Theater
450 West 37th St. between Ninth & Tenth Aves.
January 30 – February 3, $20-$25
866-811-4111
bacnyc.org
www.rosas.be/en

Belgian choreographer Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker and her Rosas company open Baryshnikov Arts Center’s spring season with the New York premiere of Verklärte Nacht (“Transfigured Night”), running January 30 to February 3 in the Jerome Robbins Theater. It is set to Arnold Schönberg’s same-titled 1899 piece (op. 4) for string quartet by Pierre Boulez and the New York Philharmonic, inspired by the poem by German Symbolist Richard Dehmel, which begins, “Two figures pass through the bare, cold grove; / the moon accompanies them, they gaze into it. / The moon races above some tall oaks; / No trace of a cloud filters the sky’s light, / into which the dark treetops stretch.” The fifty-minute work will be performed by Boštjan Antončič, Cynthia Loemij, and Igor Shyshko; the lighting is by De Keersmaeker and Luc Schaltin, with costumes by Rosas / Rudy Sabounghi. Music is central to De Keersmaeker’s discipline; in September 2017, she presented A Love Supreme at New York Live Arts, a partly improvised re-creation of the masterful John Coltrane record, followed in September 2018 by her adaptation of Bach’s Six Brandenburg Concertos at the Park Avenue Armory. De Keersmaeker premiered Verklärte Nacht in 1995 with an ensemble but restructured it in 2014 for three dancers, concentrating more on the narrative elements of the poem.

AN EVENING WITH RALPH LEMON AND POPE.L

Bruce Nauman’s “Wall/Floor Positions” is centerpiece of Modern Mondays presentation at MoMA January 28

Who: Ralph Lemon, Pope.L, Adrienne Edwards
What: Dance, response, and discussion
Where: The Museum of Modern Art, Theater 2, 11 West 53rd St. between Fifth & Sixth Aves., 212-708-9400
When: Monday, January 28, 7:00
Why: In conjunction with the exhibition “Bruce Nauman: Disappearing Acts” at MoMA and MoMA PS1, the museum’s Modern Mondays program on January 28 will begin with Minnesota-raised dancer, choreographer, and writer Ralph Lemon offering a meditation on the multidisciplinary artist’s “Wall/Floor Positions,” which is performed daily at MoMA by various dancers. Newark-born visual artist and 2017 Bucksbaum Award winner William Pope.L, who is creating an installation for the Whitney for the fall, will then offer his response to the piece, followed by a discussion with Lemon and Pope.L, moderated by Whitney curator Adrienne Edwards. The wide-ranging Nauman exhibition continues at MoMA through February 25.

JUDSON DANCE THEATER: THE WORK IS NEVER DONE

Anna Halprin, “The Branch,” 1957. Performed on the Halprin family’s Dance Deck, Kentfield, California, 1957. Performers, from left: A. A. Leath, Anna Halprin, and Simone Forti (Photo by Warner Jepson. Courtesy of the Estate of Warner Jepson)

MoMA, Museum of Modern Art
11 West 53rd St. between Fifth & Sixth Aves.
Through February 3, $25
212-708-9400
www.moma.org

On April 24, 2010, I was observing revolutionary dancer and choreographer Anna Halprin lead a workshop at Judson Memorial Church when she saw me sitting by myself, came over to me, grabbed my hand, and playfully demanded that I participate. Soon I was making a drawing, running around in circles, and sliding across the floor. Halprin, who is ninety-eight, is one of numerous artists being celebrated in the wonderful MoMA exhibition “Judson Dance Theater: The Work Is Never Done,” which continues through February 3. The wide-ranging show consists of approximately 275 photographs, videos, posters, scores, sketches, instructions, programs, announcements, audio clips, newspaper articles, and other ephemera detailing the history of the arts institution that began in the lovely and historic Judson Memorial Church, located on Washington Square South, in 1962, five years after the church started hosting gallery shows by such artists as Robert Rauschenberg and Claes Oldenburg. Throughout the run of the show, there have also been live performances in MoMA’s Marron Atrium.

Lucinda Childs. Interior Drama. 1977. Performed in Lucinda Childs: Early Works, 1963–78, as part of Judson Dance Theater: The Work Is Never Done, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, September 16, 2018–February 3, 2019. Performers: Katie Dorn, Sarah Hillmon, Sharon Milanese, Caitlin Scranton, Shakirah Stewart. Digital image © 2018 The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Photo by Paula Court)

Lucinda Childs, Interior Drama, 1977. Performed in “Lucinda Childs: Early Works, 1963–78,” as part of “Judson Dance Theater: The Work Is Never Done,” performed by Katie Dorn, Sarah Hillmon, Sharon Milanese, Caitlin Scranton, and Shakirah Stewart (Digital image © 2018 the Museum of Modern Art, New York. Photo by Paula Court)

“So, what was Judson? It was a place. It was a group of people. It was a movement,” MoMA media and performance art curator Ana Janevski says on the audio guide. Associate curator Thomas J. Lax adds, “Judson was a group of emerging choreographers, visual artists, composers, and filmmakers. A new kind of avant-garde. They rehearsed, experimented, argued, collaborated, and in the process transformed the world of dance together.” The exhibition highlights choreographers Lucinda Childs, Merce Cunningham, Yvonne Rainer, Steve Paxton, Trisha Brown, Simone Forti, David Gordon, and James Waring, composers La Monte Young, John Cage, and Philip Corner, dancers Fred Herko, Rudy Perez, and Judith Dunn, visual artists Carolee Schneemann, Stan Vanderbeek, Robert Morris, Robert Whitman, Rosalyn Drexler, Fred McDarrah, Oldenburg, and Rauschenberg, and dance critic Jill Johnston. There’s an entire section devoted to Halprin and her architect husband, Lawrence Halprin, including photographs, exercises, a letter from Young, a Cunningham lecture, and more centered around their Dance Deck summer workshop.

nstallation view of Judson Dance Theater: The Work Is Never Done, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, September 16, 2018–February 3, 2019. © 2018 The Museum of Modern Art. Photo: Peter Butler

Just as I took part in one of Halprin’s workshops at Judson Memorial Church, you can participate in a class or workshop in MoMA’s atrium being taught by Movement Research, which has been based at the church since 1991. There will be morning classes taught by Nial Jones, Joanna Kotze, Bebe Miller, and Paloma McGregor, afternoon somatics classes with mayfield brooks, iele palooumpis and Jaime Ortega, Bradley Teal Ellis, and K. J. Holmes, and workshop manifestations with Ellis, brooks, and Jennifer Monson, in addition to a reading group, the “Tracing Beyond” Studies Project with panelists Ambika Raina, Miguel Gutierrez, Parijat Desai, Tara Aisha Willis, and David Thomson on January 24, and Fun Friday on January 25 with Antonio Ramos. All events are free with advance registration and will give you an inside look at what has made Judson Dance Theater so influential and critical in the history of dance and performance in New York City and around the globe. “Judson is Open Arms, Judson is Big Momma,” dancer, choreographer, and teacher Aileen Passloff explains on the audio guide. “Judson is come in whatever you need we’re gonna try to give it to you. You will need a shower, come here. There’s a shower, there’s a toilet, there’s a place to eat your lunch. You want to practice, there’s a place to practice. You know the thing about those guys is, well, they believed in us, and they believed in the world.”

MUST-SEE WEEK 2019

must see week

Multiple venues
January 21 – February 10
www.nycgo.com

The rising price of admissions in New York City got you down? You can check out some big-time Big Apple institutions January 21 to February 10 during Must-See Week, when tickets to many cultural stalwarts go BOGO, offering two-for-one discounts. Among the participating attractions are the 9/11 Tribute Museum, the Bronx Zoo, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, the Brooklyn Museum, the Cooper Hewitt, the Empire State Building Observatory, the Intrepid, the Mount Vernon Hotel Museum & Garden, the Museum at Eldridge Street Synagogue, the Museum of Chinese in America, MoMA, the Museum of the City of New York, the New York Botanical Garden, the New York City Ballet, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, the Rink at Rockefeller Center, the UN, and more. While you can get some tickets in advance, others require in-person vouchers.