this week in dance

DE MATERIE (THE MATTER)

Heiner Goebbels’s adaptation of Louis Andriessen’s DE MATERIE is an audio and visual wonder — complete with sheep and light-up zeppelins (photo by Stephanie Berger)

Park Ave. Armory, Wade Thompson Drill Hall
643 Park Ave. between 66th & 67th Sts.
March 22–30, $85-$195
212-933-5812
www.armoryonpark.org

Regardless of how well prepared you think you are for Heiner Goebbels’s awesomely strange spectacle De Materie, you’re not; get ready to be confused, amazed, bewildered, delighted, mesmerized, and frustrated, often all at the same time. Goebbels’s awe-inspiring version of Dutch new music composer Louis Andriessen’s four-part masterwork, initially presented at the 2014 Ruhrtriennale at a former power plant in Germany, is making its North American stage premiere this month in the Wade Thompson Drill Hall at the Park Avenue Armory, where it fits like a glove. The nearly two-hour work is divided into four very different sections that explore freedom and innovation through the age-old philosophical battle between matter and spirit. De Materie is constructed like an architectural magnum opus of experimental music, dance, art, theater, opera, and science, with many memorable parts that come together to form an ever-greater whole . . . or not, as tenor Pascal Charbonneau explains, intoning passages from Dutch physicist Gorlaeus’s Idea physicae. A small choir sings “Plakkaat van Verlatinghe,” the Act of Abjuration declaring Dutch independence from Spain, and later adds sections from a 1690 primer on shipbuilding (“Aeloude and hedendaegsche Scheepsbouw en Bestier”) by Nicolaas Witsen. Subtitles are projected onto glowing zeppelins, walls, and tents in which silhouettes mysteriously gather.

DE MATERIE features music, dance, theater, art, spoken word, philosophy, mysticism, and even boogie-woogie (photo by Wonge Bergmann)

Thirteenth-century devotional mystic poet Hadewijch (soprano Evgeniya Sotnikova) sings of corporeal love with God as black-covered figures on benches behind her change position every time the lights go off and then on again. Piet Mondrian’s 1927 “Composition with Red, Yellow, and Blue” is brought to life with swinging pendulums as Gauthier Dedieu and Niklas Taffner dance the boogie-woogie and the theory of the line is discussed through texts by mathematician and theosophist M. H. J. Schoenmaekers. Madame Curie (Catherine Milliken) reads from her Nobel Prize acceptance speech and the diary she kept following the death of her husband. And one hundred sheep from Pennsylvania bleat from the back of the hall, although no translation is provided. The dramatic, varied score is performed with vigor by the fifty-plus members of the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE) and ChorWerk Ruhr, conducted by Peter Rundel. The sets and lighting by Klaus Grünberg and sound design by Norbert Ommer are mind-blowing; the fab costumes are by Florence von Gerkan, with choreography by Florian Bilbao. So, when put together, what’s it all about? In his director’s note in the program, Goebbels, who previously presented Stifters Dinge at the armory in December 2009, writes, “Our visual solutions for this piece — tents in the first act, benches in the second, the pendulum in the third, and the sheep in the fourth act — aren’t symbols for something that needs to be deciphered or understood. They all are what they are: tents, benches, pendulum, and sheep — and zeppelins. But what you feel or imagine about them — that is your business alone. Just don’t underestimate the sheep.” Actually, you shouldn’t underestimate any of this equally dazzling and head-scratching adaptation of one of the great new-music compositions of the twentieth-century.

DUET: GIBNEY DANCE COMPANY

MAKING SPACE
Gibney Dance Agnes Varis Performing Arts Center
280 Broadway between Chambers & Reade Sts.
March 23-26, $15-$20
gibneydance.org

After premiering its twenty-fifth anniversary program, Duet, at the Sevgi Gönül Cultural Center in Turkey, Gibney Dance is bringing it all back home, presenting the work, which consists of restaged excerpts from throughout the company’s repertoire, at the Gibney Dance Agnes Varis Performing Arts Center at 280 Broadway. The performance will take place at various spaces throughout the center, with limited seating as the audience follows the movement conversations, which date back to Gibney’s 1992 piece, Landings, and include a sneak peek at Gibney’s newest work, which will debut later this year. The duets will be performed by Natsuki Arai, Nigel Campbell, Alexeya Eyma-Manderson, Amy Miller, Devin Oshiro, and Brandon Welch, with music by Ryan Lott (Son Lux). “Assembling this program has been a labor of love, and an opportunity for me to reflect upon twenty-five years of artistic collaboration and life experience,” Gibney explained in a statement. “In looking back, I have thought a lot about the uncertainty of making art and sustaining a career over decades — and what it means to make something that disappears before your eyes. . . . I hope you will join me in relocating these past works here in 280 Broadway’s smallest spaces and corners that I have come to love.” The company moved into the downtown space in the fall of 2014; Duet is part of a reimagining of the company and the location for the future.

DE MATERIE

Heiner Goebbels’s multidisciplinary reimagining of Louis Andriessen’s DE MATERIE runs at the Park Avenue Armory March 22-30 (photo by Wonge Bergmann)

Park Ave. Armory, Wade Thompson Drill Hall
643 Park Ave. between 66th & 67th Sts.
March 22–30, $85-$195
212-933-5812
www.armoryonpark.org

Dutch composer Louis Andriessen’s four-part magnum opus, De Materie, makes its North American stage debut this month at the Park Avenue Armory, in a wildly inventive production directed by Heiner Goebbels, whose Stifters Dinge had its U.S. premiere at the armory in December 2009. Andriessen’s visionary work weaves in dance, spoken text, choral singing, jazz, science, philosophy, poetry, Renaissance music, and more, with Goebbels adding, among other things, one hundred sheep. Among those being referenced in the piece, which explores the relationship between matter and spirit, are Madame Curie, Piet Mondrian, Hadewijch, David Gorlaeus, and the De Stijl art movement. The work will be performed by the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), conducted by Peter Rundel, with the ChorWerk Ruhr, more than two dozen actors and dancers, and others; tenor Pascal Charbonneau is Gorlaeus, soprano Evgeniya Sotnikova is Hadewijch, and Catherine Milliken is Madame Curie. The stage and lighting design is by Klaus Grünberg, with costumes by Florence von Gerkan, sound by Norbert Ommer, and choreography by Florian Bilbao. “This highly imaginative collaboration asks us to appreciate the inherent connections between all manner of innovation throughout society — from the discovery of radioactivity to the creation of a work of art,” new Park Avenue Armory artistic director Pierre Audi said in a statement. In addition to the six performances, there will be four special programs to shed more light on this monumental undertaking. On March 23 at 8:00 ($60), Andriessen will team up with pianist Jason Moran for “Improvisations: Louis Andriessen and Jason Moran,” an exploration of how jazz is used in De Materie while discussing improvisation in general. On March 24 at 6:00 ($15), WNYC’s John Schaefer will host “De Materie: Matter & Spirit,” a conversation with Goebbels, Columbia music professor and musician and composer George E. Lewis, and composer Missy Mazzoli. On March 25 at 6:00 ($15), Schaefer will moderate “Four Different Ways: Celebrating Louis Andriessen,” with Bang on a Can cofounder Julia Wolfe, electronic experimental musician and composer Nathan Michel, and Princeton music professor Donnacha Dennehy. And finally, on March 26 at 6:00 ($15), Audi will lead an artist talk with Goebbels, Rundel, and Andriessen.

REBECCA LAZIER AND DAN TRUEMAN: THERE MIGHT BE OTHERS

Rebecca Lazier makes NYLA debut with world premiere of THERE MIGHT BE OTHERS (photo by Maria Baranova)

New York Live Arts
219 West 19th St. between Seventh & Eighth Aves.
March 16-19, $15-$40, 7:30
212-924-0077
www.newyorklivearts.org
www.rebeccalazier.com

On the back cover of the new book There Might Be Others, which contains the music and dance score for Rebecca Lazier’s New York Live Arts commission along with collaborator notes, instructions, principles, and more, NYLA director of programs Tommy Kreigsmann says, “Seminal works of the avant-garde become so when the inherent risk at the heart of the experiment catalyzing the vision to its fruition pushes the work’s sphere of influence beyond its original form and often its intended meaning. Intrepid choreographer Rebecca Lazier [has a] penchant for musical interpretation and the infinite aesthetic and physical languages in its breadth, making her among the very best of her generation.” New York-based dancer, choreographer, and teacher Lazier will be making her NYLA debut with the world premiere of There Might Be Others on March 16-19, inspired by Terry Riley’s 1964, fifty-three-part composition, “In C,” one of the first major minimalist works. The live score will be performed by fiddler Dan Trueman and SŌ Percussion and Mobius Percussion (March 16-18) and members of Mantra Percussion (March 19). The piece features dramaturgy and design by Naomi Leonard, Davison Scandrett, and Mary Jo Mecca and will be danced by Simon Courchel, Natalie Green, raja feather kelly, Cori Kresge, Christopher Ralph, Anna Schön, Saúl Ulerio, Agnieszka Kryst, Jan Lorys, Ramona Nagabczynska, Pawel Sakowicz Rhonda Baker, Sara Coffin, and Tan Temel. On March 13 ($20, 1:30), Lazier (Coming Together/Attica, Terminal) and Trueman will host the Shared Practice workshop “Choreographing Being in Action — Staging Negotiation and Interaction,” while the March 17 show will be followed by a Stay Late Discussion with Neil Greenberg.

STEPHEN PETRONIO COMPANY: BLOODLINES II

Longtime Stephen Petronio Company dancer Gino Grenek will dance the male solo in MIDDLESEXGORGE at the Joyce this week (photo by Sarah Silver)

Joyce Theater
175 Eighth Ave. at 19th St.
March 8-13, $10-$60
212-645-2904
www.joyce.org
petron.io

Last April, Newark-born dancer and choreographer Stephen Petronio premiered his new initiative, “Bloodlines,” at the Joyce, presenting Merce Cunningham’s RainForest. The five-year project will consist of iconic works from master American choreographers, paired with a new work by Petronio. This week the New York-based company returns to the Joyce with the second edition of “Bloodlines,” performing Trisha Brown’s Glacial Decoy, her 1979 silent piece featuring costumes and visual design by Robert Rauschenberg, who also designed the lighting with Beverly Emmons. Glacial Decoy was Brown’s first piece for a proscenium stage and debuted the same year that Petronio joined her company as its first male dancer. To complement the all-female Glacial Decoy, Petronio has chosen to reconstruct his 1990 piece about gender and power, MiddleSexGorge, set to commissioned music by the British band Wire and inspired by Petronio’s participation with the AIDS activist organization ACT UP in the late 1980s. Company dancer and assistant artistic director Gino Grenek, in his seventeenth and last season with the troupe, will take the male solo and one half of the male duet. “The piece is ferocious and the dancers must be fearless in their execution of the dance. Hands grab, legs fly, heads whip, and torsos twist at warp speed. It is a rite of passage for every Petronio dancer to perform MiddleSexGorge,” Grenek writes on the company’s blog. “I adore it, I crave it, and I am humbled by it.” Also on the bill is the world premiere of Petronio’s Big Daddy Deluxe, an updated version of his 2014 solo “talking dance” Big Daddy, a tribute to his late father, built around text from Petronio’s 2014 memoir, Confessions of a Motion Addict; the work has now been expanded for the full company, which includes Grenek, Davalois Fearon, Kyle Filley, Cori Kresge, Jaqlin Medlock, Tess Montoya, Nicholas Sciscione, Emily Stone, and Joshua Tuason. The March 10 performance will be followed by a Curtain Chat with members of the company

PLATFORM 2016 — A BODY IN PLACES: EIKO SOLOS

Eiko performs one of her solos for an intimate audience in a Lower East Side textile studio as part of Danspace Project Platform series (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

Eiko performs one of her solos for an intimate audience in a Lower East Side textile studio as part of Danspace Project’s “Platform” series (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

A BODY IN PLACES: EIKO SOLO #4
Danspace Project
St. Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery
131 East Tenth St. between Second & Third Aves.
Monday – Friday through March 19, $20, varying times
Platform continues through March 23
866-811-4111
www.danspaceproject.org
eiko solo #4 slideshow

New York-based Japanese dancer and choreographer Eiko Otake’s “A Body in Places” is the centerpiece of Danspace Project’s tenth “Platform” series, a five-week multidisciplinary exploration of Eiko’s work, including live performances, art and video installations, film screenings, lectures and discussions, a book club, and more. Every Monday through Friday, Eiko will be performing “A Body in Places: Eiko Solos,” unique hour-long dances that occur around Danspace’s home at St. Mark’s Church on East Tenth St. Between ten and twenty-five ticket holders will meet at the church, then be led to a secret location, where Eiko will perform exclusively for them. On March 3, the group walked over to 44 East Third St., a three-story townhouse that once was the home of the Reuben Gallery, the site of the first Happenings back in 1959, and currently the studio of textile artist Suzanne Tick. The performance began in the basement, as Eiko, wearing a luxurious kimono, moved alongside Tick working at a loom as the audience gathered around the space. At her trademark slow pace — but with occasional bursts of energy — Eiko headed up the stairs and continued in the main room, spreading out her arms and legs, then bringing her body together in an almost fetal-like position, and even emitting guttural sounds, before heading to the top floor, where, during part of her performance, one of Tick’s cats rested next to her on the floor until Eiko got up and eventually concluded with a flourish in the outdoor patio. It was an intimate, one-of-a-kind performance, a modern-day Happening, during which the performer and the crowd bonded in touching ways amid the unusual surroundings. The solos continue through March 19 at a different time each day; among the other locations on the schedule are the ANNA clothing store on East Eleventh St., Middle Collegiate Church on Second Ave., Dashwood Books on Bond St., the Sirovich Center for Balanced Living on East Twelfth St., and the Zürcher Gallery on Bleecker St. For our interview with Eiko about the Platform series as a whole, go here.

FIRST SATURDAY: SHE KNOWS NO BOUNDS

Honeybird will be part of woman-centric lineup at Brooklyn Museums First Saturday program on March 6 (photo by Monique Mizrahi)

Honeybird will be part of woman-centric lineup at Brooklyn Museum’s First Saturday program on March 5 (photo by Monique Mizrahi)

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

Women are the headliners at the Brooklyn Museum’s free March First Saturday program. There will be live music by Honeybird, Denitia and Sene, Yahzarah, and drummers from Tom Tom magazine (with a talkback moderated by Mindy Abovitz); dance by the Erica Essner Performance Co-Op (“Reflex 2015,” followed by a Q&A); storytelling by Ashley “SAYWUT?!” Moyer and Queer Memoir; a screening of Faythe Levine and Sam Macon’s Sign Painters, followed by a talkback with Levine and sign painter Marcine Franckowiak; an art workshop; and pop-up gallery talks. In addition, the galleries are open late so you can check out such exhibitions as “Coney Island: Visions of an American Dreamland, 1861–2008,” “Stephen Powers: Coney Island Is Still Dreamland (to a Seagull),’” “Forever Coney: Photographs from the Brooklyn Museum Collection,” “This Place,” and “Agitprop!”